


Alienation

by oswwinoswald



Category: Free!
Genre: 2016 Summer Olympics, Alternate Universe, Boy x boy, Closeted Character, Coming Out, Coming of Age, Free! Eternal Summer, Gay Character, Gay Sex, Homophobic Language, Homosexuality, M/M, Male Homosexuality, Multi, Olympics, Sexual Content, Slurs, Swimming, Swimming Boys, Yaoi, free! iwatobi swim club
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-21
Updated: 2014-09-07
Packaged: 2018-02-05 13:02:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 39,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1819411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oswwinoswald/pseuds/oswwinoswald
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>2016 Summer Olympic AU: Rin Matsuoka and Haruka Nanase were childhood best friends and members of the same swim club, Rin starts to think of Haru as more than a friend, something he fears will not only destroy their friendship but also his family life. In a last ditch effort to save his reputation and family he transfers to a swimming school in Australia only to return to Japan years later after his acceptance to the Japanese Olympic Team, little does he know he's not the only one who got accepted a certain someone with pretty blue eyes and a tendency to strip around water falls back into his life unexpectedly and this time he doesn't think he can catch himself before he falls. </p><p>A Rinharu fanfic, because life and Free! Eternal Summer.</p><p>(UPDATED EVERY SUNDAY)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Mackerel

**Author's Note:**

> Helllllo! I'm Jess, that wasn't all that necessary, but okay! This story is Rinharu and will contain gay smut, no avoiding it, however this story is founded on a plot and therefore you may have to wait a bit, but I promise lots of fluff to keep you going :D But okay here's the deal and if you decided not to read this hopefully you will,
> 
> PAY ATTENTION NOW BECAUSE CAPS AND WOW THIS IS SOMETHING YOU NEED TO KNOW BEFORE READING
> 
> In this story, Rin has never met Makoto or Nagisa. Haru doesn't know Nagisa, but had been good friends with Makoto for quite sometime. They were on the same swim team. Nagisa and Rei are a thing already, and they know each other...duh? And Nitori is just a cute little baby as always. Gou is in this quite a lot as well, the other characters and ships are listed up there so go see.
> 
> ps This work will possibly contain homophobic slurs in some way or another because of plot. 
> 
> Follow me on tumblr: oswwinoswald (or for anime at aloisearltrancy)
> 
> If you like this you can make things or write reviews or whatever I tract the tag: oswwinoswald fic, oswwinoswald, and fic: alienation 
> 
> Thanks so much please leave kudos or comments if ya like it helps me write more :)
> 
> We'll start updating this fic every Sunday (idk about this Sunday though as I'll be out of town) So the next chapter may be up tomorrow or Tuesday.

Prologue

The logic behind it was flawed. That much I knew for sure, and at the time that was about the only thing I knew for sure. Everything else was blurry, like putting on glasses that aren’t your prescription, I could see what was happening well enough to know I should be afraid of it, but not well enough to know why or for it to make since. It was like one day Haru and I are splashing around the pool joking, or coming as close to joking as Haru can, and the next day I can’t look at him without my heart beating a hundred miles an hour. What was that about? I’d never felt like that before, and then all of the sudden here’s this new feeling telling me to kiss him when before the thought wouldn’t have even crossed my mind. And I hated it because I could tell that he didn’t look at me the way I looked at him, and he didn’t smile for me the way I smiled for him, and I didn’t make him happy the way he made me happy. And although I knew it shouldn’t…it hurt. It hurt like hell. Because he didn’t like me how I liked him and he probably never would.

            It wasn’t natural after all. For a boy to like other boys…I’d heard my mother shout about it a hundred times, nearly every day… “Homosexuality is a sin!” she’d shout to no one in particular or maybe to everyone at once, I couldn’t tell, but either way she said it…over and over and over again and I heard it over and over and over again until it was drilled into my head: I couldn’t like Haruka, because if I liked Haruka I’d be gay. And being gay was bad. I wouldn’t let myself be gay. Not if I wanted to keep my family…and I did. I wanted to keep my family more than anything, I’d already lost my father, I couldn’t afford to lose my mother and my sister too. So I did what I thought was necessary, I pushed him away, got some big scholarship to some big swimming school in Australia where I could train for the Olympics on my own. Without Haru, without complicated feelings, just me, a pool, and a bunch of people I didn’t know. A bunch of people I didn’t care to know, because regardless of what I did, regardless of how hard I tried to push him away, to keep him out of my head, he just kept coming back. Every time I thought I was over it his face would pop into my head and remind me who I was…what I was…remind me that no matter how hard I tried the pretty girls on the sidelines asking for my number would never interest me. Nor would anyone else…all I wanted was Haru, and he was the one thing I could never have.

            I lived behind a wall no one could see through. A wall no one could penetrate. I shut everyone out, I was alone and I was content with being alone. Alone meant no disappointing people that loved you (how could you when there was no one to disappoint?), no one to fight with (not that alone didn’t come with its share of fist fights), and last, but (regrettably) not least, no Haruka Nanase to make me feel things I didn’t want to feel, alone was keeping me safe, _was_ being the optimal word there, it had been keeping me safe, up until six months before the 2016 Summer Olympics, when my family moved back to Japan and I became a full time resident at the Olympic Training center, little did I know the person in the room next to me was the very person I’d been trying to keep out and here he was asking if I had any mackerel. _Haruka._

Chapter 1

_Mackerel_

“Rin!” Gou shouted loud enough to get my attention, she stood hands on her hips, waiting impatiently for me by the opened trunk of my car, “Come get your bags, gosh you’re either really nervous or crazy excited because you haven’t heard a word that’s come out of my mouth this entire trip.” Mild concern laced her tone.

“A little bit of both I guess.” I said grabbing my duffle bag from the trunk and throwing it over my shoulder carelessly, I was definitely a little bit of both with a pinch of fear thrown into the mix. The Olympics? When the hell had that happened?

“Well don’t be!” A smile suddenly spread across her face, she grabbed onto his arm enthusiastically, “This is a _huge_ step. I mean look where we are? The Olympic Training Center, you made the team Rin! You’re going to be competing, that’s like, all you ever wanted, right?”

“Yeah,” I forced a smile, “Yeah, I guess you’re right. This is what I’ve been training for forever.”

“And to think, I actually got that internship at the same time you’re gonna be here! We get to spend time together for once Rin!” she bounced up and down barely able to contain her excitement, I snickered, the brat was a good sister and I was looking forward to spending the next six months with her well I trained, but I’d never tell her that. Duh.

“So, do you have any idea where we’re supposed to be going?” I asked after a moment, remembering the heavy duffle on my shoulder.

“Did you read that paper I gave you about rooming?” I shot her a look that stated clearly I hadn’t, she gave an exasperated sigh, “Do you have it at least?”

“Uh…” I rummaged around in my jean pockets with no luck, moving to the pockets of my old training jacket that I wore everywhere, pulling out a faded pink slip of paper and handing it to her.

She glared up at me and unfolded it, “Dammit Rin, did you get this wet?”

My jacket never left my side, I always wore it, and when I was swimming it usually wasn’t far away, not to mention I usually didn’t bother to use a towel either so, yeah, the possibility it’d gotten wet wasn’t exactly slim. I was a professional swimmer for crying out loud, what did she expect? I just shrugged and muttered, “Probably.”

“Ugh, okay, let me try to make this out…” she studied the paper intently, “So it looks like you’re in building F, which is where most of the swimmers stay, dorm E11, room B.”

I cocked an eyebrow, “What the hell is this? Alphabet soup?”

“If you bothered to actually read the guide book you’d know, there are seven residential dorms, the different sports are put in buildings alphabetically, each sport has its own floor, also depending on where it falls in the alphabet, there are around twenty dorms on each floor, for both the Olympic team members and the trainees, dorms are six people to each, two in each of the separate rooms, they include a small kitchen and living area, there’s a communal bathroom at the end of each hall. And before you ask,” she paused to look at me, “there’s an exactly mirrored resident for the girls across campus.”

I don’t know why she thinks I’d ask that, I had little to no interest in where the girls dorm was located, I wasn’t planning on making any trips there. I wasn’t a girl, but instead of arguing my innocence I decided to call her out on her math, “So technically here are fourteen residential dorms then?”

“What?”

“Seven for boys, seven for girls?”

“Yes…”

“So fourteen.”

“Oh my god Rin, just go find your dorm, smartass.”

I smiled at her, “Just pointing it out.” Then I remembered, “So…since you’re not an athlete where are you staying?”

“There’s a faculty dorm as well, I’ll be staying there. With the girls swimming coach actually, Sensei Amakata.”

“How do you know who you’re rooming with?” I asked curiously.

“Because _my_ paper didn’t get so soaked I couldn’t make out the names.” She said matter-of-factly.

“ _Well then.”_ The sarcasm evident in my tone.

She laughed, “Just go settle in, meet everyone, call me when you finish unpacking and we’ll meet for dinner or something kay?”

“Kay.” I said non-chalantly.

She placed a chaste kiss on my cheek, “Be good, don’t get thrown out of here before you can compete.”

“Yeah yeah.” I waved her off, she smirked knowingly and pointed behind me, ‘ _That way’_ she mouthed before skipping off in the opposite direction.

I rolled my eyes and started off the way I’d been directed, there were signs to help me find my way and after about a thirty minute walk I arrived at my dorm. It was exactly where Gou had said it would be, and looked exactly how she’d described, a tiny kitchen, and living area that consisted of nothing but a couch and plain wooden coffee table. Nothing special, but nice, there were three rooms extending off the living area, each labeled with more god damn letters. I found B easily noticing as I passed the open door of room A that there was already stuff inside, the two beds were made, one neater than the other by a few degrees, the neat one was covered by a fluffy white comforter, a white and blue jacket that I assumed had belonged to the persons previous swim team was draped over the headboard, and a stuffed killer whale was snuggled up against the fluffy white pillow. I noted the occupant’s cleanliness and respected it immediately. The other bed was also made, neat enough though not quite to my standards, it was clad with a navy blue comforter, and mixed match yellow pillow stood out vibrantly against the dark color, a jacket identical to the one at on the other beds head board was strewn across the foot of the bed along with a neatly folded pile of swimsuits. All the exact same I noticed immediately, black with purple accents. There were at least twelve of them there, and it made me wonder who the hell could possibly need or use twelve identical swim suites, like seriously what the hell? I sighed before noticing a dolphin plushie that matched the whale in design and size pretty well. _Weird._ I thought, did these guys have matching stuffed animals and jackets for a reason?

I brushed it off, guessing I’d probably meet them soon enough anyway so there was no point in lingering. I twisted the nob of my own room, finding, much to my surprise, a feminine looking boy with close cropped violet hair and of soft face, resting on his bed back pushed up against the wall tapping away at his phone. His bed was a little disheveled looking, though I couldn’t tell if it was because he’d been sitting on it or if he’d made it carelessly, he noticed me  upon my entering and his face was suddenly lit up with a bright smile that was so full of innocence it put four year old singing in church choirs to shame.

He slid off the bed and approached me immediately extending a polite hand, “Hello there! You must be Matsouka-senpai?”

I took it with a small smile, “That’s me, just Rin though no need for honorifics…”

“No, I mean,  I’m…I’ve seen you race, senpai. You’re amazing…Nitori by the way.”

“Er…thanks, that’s uh nice of you.” I said not exactly sure how I should react.

“You’re time is amazing!” Nitori said excitedly, “Six seconds from beating Phelps’ record, right? That’s insane!”

I could feel the blush rising to my cheeks, but I played down my flattery, “Uh yeah on my good days, I mean I’m hoping to beat his time, but it takes a lotta work,” I was going to tell him how much, but then I remembered he was a swimmer as well, he already knew, so I stated the obvious, “but you know that.”

“Yeah, takes a lot of conditioning to get that good huh? I practice all the time, but my times not even half that, you’re like, amazing senpai!” the enthusiasm in his voice shocked Rin a little, he shook his head.

“Just Rin.”

“Sorry senpai—I mean sorry…Rin.” He looked uncomfortable saying it, like he’s just tasted something awful, and I decided I wouldn’t correct him if he called me senpai again, the look on his face was enough to tell me he liked it better than my actual name.

“It’s alright, so have you met anyone else in the dorm yet? I noticed there were things unpacked next door.”

“Oh! Um, I met one of them, his name was Matoko, he’s nice, he said his roommate went to the pool as soon he unpacked, getting in some last minute practice I suppose,” _Hmph, reminds me of someone I used to know,_ he internally hit himself for thinking about said person and continued to listen to the violet haired boy, “anyway the other ones either haven’t gotten here yet or I haven’t seen them, but they’re all swimmers so that’s good!”

“Yeah I guess we won’t have to worry about different schedules or anything.”

He nodded, “I’m guessing that’s why they group us this way, so there aren’t like, gymnasts disturbing the swimmers they room with during their down time and vice versa. Rest is important for athletes after all.” he smiled, “Anyway, I’m gonna make a quick trip to the supermarket and stock the fridge a little so we don’t starve, do you want anything?” the kid was too nice for his own good.

“No I think I’m good, thanks though.” The boy blushed, but said nothing, leaving with a quick wave.

The little homosexual devil inside me managed to remind me that the boy I was rooming with was cute, before I pushed the thoughts back down and went about unpacking my things, trying to think as little as possible well doing it.

After an hour I had everything where it ought to be, put neatly away, and I was happy with my progress, I’d also straightened the comforter on Nitori’s bed, and I sincerely hoped the kid didn’t notice. He still wasn’t back from the market when their other roommates arrived, he introduced himself politely, noting by the boxes and suit cases they probably weren’t the ones whose stuff was in room A.

“Rin-san!” the shorter of the two said happily he was blond with a smile that lit up the room and bubbly pink eyes, “I’m Nagisa Hazuki! This is my boyfriend Rei!” he motioned to the taller male who was wearing thick rimmed red glasses and now a noticeable blush on his cheeks, though Nagisa didn’t seem to notice, “We all have something in common Rin-san, all of us are boys with girl names! What a coincidence, this must mean we’ll be the best of friends Rin-Rin!”

I managed a laugh, it was hard for me to keep up with people as energetic as Nagisa, not that I didn’t have energy, but just that Nagisa was one of those people whose presence filled up an entire room and I wasn’t used to that.

Rei saved me from having to answer by extending a hand, “Rei Ryugazak, it’s nice to meet you Rin-san. Sorry about Nagisa, he can be a bit much.”

Nagisa laughed and reached up on his tiptoes to kiss Rei on the cheek, “Maybe but you love me anyway.”

Rei’s arm wrapped around Nagisa’s tiny waist and he kissed his hair, “Obviously,” he laughed before adding, “idiot.”

I felt a sharp stab of jealousy for them. Why couldn’t I have that? Why did I have to hide how I was? It wasn’t fair.

“Oh! Rin-san!” Nagisa said suddenly, “You don’t mind do you? I mean, you don’t mind… _us._ ”It was the most serious ton I would ever hear the blond boy use.

“No,” I said calmly though I was anything, but calm, the jealousy was literally eating away at me even though I knew it shouldn’t be, “No, not at all.”

Nagisa’s smile returned and he threw his arms around my neck, “Yay!” he squealed, “That’s fantastic Rin-san!”

“No,” I said after a moment of thought, “that’s just not being an asshole.”

Nagisa laughed and Rei raised an eyebrow and gave him a slight smile before saying, “We’re going to go unpack.”

The two headed in the direction of their room before Nagisa turned around and said with a smile, “Maybe when the others get here we can all go to dinner or something?”

I thought momentarily of Gou, though they surely wouldn’t mind her coming along, and the nodded, when I returned to my room I felt like screaming. They seemed nice enough, actually they seemed really fucking nice which is why I hated the jealousy. I just wanted what they had, but I knew, I fucking knew I could never have it and it drove me crazy. I didn’t even let myself look at boys, let alone touch them like that, not that I didn’t want to, but I just couldn’t…my mother would hate me, my sister would...I actually had no idea what she would do, but I didn’t let not knowing turn into hope. I took a deep breath, I would be fine, Haru was miles away from here. There was nothing to worry about. He was still the only person I’d actually felt actual feelings for anyway. I could suppress sex drives, but feelings? I wasn’t so sure about feelings…I was the type of person whose felt with everything they were…suppressing feelings wouldn’t be easy for me.

I laid down on my bed and rolled over, I could hear quite laughter coming from Rei and Nagisa’s room, I squeezed my eyes shut deciding to take a long awaited nap, sleep came quickly, and I was grateful for the peace that it brought.

……

It must have been an hour later when I woke up. I could hear muffled voiced through the door, though I didn’t pay them much attention, I glanced over at Nitori’s bed finding it unchanged aside from a set of keys and his wallet, I guessed the kid must have gotten home from the store.

I set up in bed and swung my legs over the side, pushing a few stray maroon locks out of my eyes, I grabbed my phone off the dresser where I’d tossed it earlier,  three missed calls and six texts, all from Gou. I read the texts.

**Gou (3:10):  hey! did u finish unpacking??? who r ur dorm mates?? wanna meet for dinner l8r?**

**Gou (4:31): heyyyyy answer ur phone! it’s like 4:30, now wanna meet at 5:45?**

**Gou (4:45) : u okay????**

**Gou (5:02): rin pick up ur phone or im coming over there**

**Gou (5:19): helllllllllo??**

**Gou (5:25): dammit rin!**

The last text had arrived six minutes ago, I decided to call her, she answered on the first ring.

“Rin! Why haven’t you been answering me?”

“Fell asleep…” I said with a yawn.

“Dorm mates that boring?”

“No actually, they’re nice, I mean the ones I’ve met anyway.” I thought back to meeting Nagisa, Rei, and Nitori. Yeah they were nice.

“Oh okay well that’s good, do you wanna meet for dinner or no?”

“Yeah, that’d be nice. 5:45 right?”

“Yep!” she chirped, “There’s a cute little diner on campus, serves all of that super healthy no-trans-fat athlete food you like, it’s by the gymnastics gym and the indoor pool, the one for all students not for swimmers. I’m sure one of your roommates can tell you where to go.”

“I hope so because I’m not about to get lost as hell trying to—“ a knock on the door interrupted me.

“Hello? Rin you still there?”

“Yeah, hold on one second Gou.” I covered the speaker with my hand and shouted, “One second!” while I made my way to the door quickly, I wasn’t paying much attention when I opened it, I was too busy telling Gou again to be quiet, before I looked up to see who’d graced me with their presence, my mouth fell opened upon seeing them, _oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit_ , my head screamed at me, the phone fell out of my hand, he hadn’t looked at me yet. He bent down to pick up my phone, “There’s mackerel in the fridge,” he said before he ever even looked at me, “can I eat it?” finally he held the phone out to me and his eyes widened as noticed me, I could see it click in his mind, I could feel it fitting together like puzzle pieces, “Rin?”

I didn’t need to phrase his name like a question, I knew who I was looking at, the face I’d never been able to forget, “Haru.” Haruka Nanase stood before me, black hair damp, blue eyes shining with memories I’d buried years ago, and my phone in the palm of his outstretched hand.

 _Holy fucking shit._ Was the only thing I could think.

 

 

 

 


	2. A Sight You've Never Seen Before

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Gou is a fangirl, there is mackerel, and Makoto totally ships it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay next chapter whoooop! Super excited! I know I said Tuesday, but I ended up having to stay an extra day anyway I'm only a day late yay! The next update will be on Sunday so look forward to that. 
> 
> Also the slang and things in this story are going to be American mainly because I'm American, sorry, but we do have honorifics and obviously it's in Japan so Japanese traditions and things are a must. 
> 
> Don't really want the notes to be hella long so please just remember to tell me what you think with a comment if you've already left kudos it's really really helpful I promise <3 Makes me wanna write so much. This fic is completely un-beta so tell me if ya see any mistakes. 
> 
> Thanks so so much for your responses last time. Follow me on tumblr: oswwinoswald and if you wanna do fanart or reviews or anything you can tag it: 'fic: alienation', 'oswwinoswald', or 'oswwinoswald fic' Thank you very much! Please enjoy <3

Haru’s face was calm, as he placed the phone back in my hand, Gou was yelling something I had no intention of responding to, without a word I lifted the phone to my ear and managed to mumble, “Let me call you back.”  Before ending the call hastily.

A smile, something that was rare to say the least for Haru, spread across his thin lips making my heart flutter, “Is it really you?”

His eyes were so blue and hopeful it actually fucking hurt me to look into them, I sucked in a deep breath, sincerely hoping he didn’t notice and played it off like it was no big deal, “In the flesh.” I said with a faux grin.

When he didn’t answer right away I decided to speak, “The Olympics huh? I thought competing wasn’t your thing?”

“It wasn’t.” he said simply, “Makoto forced me onto the swim team and an Olympic scout took it from there…I still don’t like it…but he said I could swim free and there were pools and…” after the mention of swimming free his eyes went alight, he glanced up at me and blushed slightly, before shaking his head, “You must be happy, the Olympics is all you ever wanted.”

I laughed, slightly happy that he remembered my lifelong dream, “Yeah it’s pretty unreal I guess, who’d have thought we’d end up in the same dorm…of all the places, I mean wow.”

“Yeah. We sort of just stopped talking after you went to Australia.”

“…Yeah…”

“Why is that?”

I suppressed the urge to come clean, I looked at him, in all his heterosexual glory, and felt a jab of pain in my heart, “I was really busy with practice and everything got all changed around so many times I just…” _Please don’t hate me for this_ , “I forgot.” I bit my lip and waited for his reply. The false words burning my tongue like acid.

He just shrugged like that answer was enough to satisfy him, “Wanna help me cook up that mackerel.” I had to admit I was a bit dumb struck by the response. It’d been what five? No, six years since we’d talked. I’d left without so much as a phone call the entire time and instead of being angry or asking more than one fucking question he was asking me to help him cook mackerel? I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry about his utter indifference to my antics.

Regardless I felt a laugh rising to my lips, _Same old Haru_ , I thought before answering, “It’s Nitori’s actually.”

“Then do you wanna go get some mackerel?”

His interest in mackerel over everything else was hilarious to say the least, I suppressed another laugh, “Where?”

“I think there’s a sushi bar somewhere on campus. Sushi bars have mackerel.”

“Is mackerel all you care about?”

“Yes.” He was dead serious.

“Okay then, uh let me make a call real quick, is it okay if my sister comes?”

Haru shrugged, “I was going to invite Makoto anyway.”

“Okay.” I said looking down at my phone, “One second.” I dialed Gou’s number.

“What was that about?!” She demanded upon answering.

“I’ll tell you over dinner, change of plans we’re having sushi.”

“Sushi? Where?” she sounded even more confused than regular.

“There’s a sushi place here apparently.”

“Uh, okay, when?”

I glanced out of my room into the living area where Haru was talking to a tall boy with dirty blond hair that had to have been the aforementioned Makoto, Haru looked in my direction raising an eyebrow, the blond boy followed his gaze to me and smiled kindly beckoning me to join them with a friendly wave, they looked ready to go. “Is now okay?”

“Sure? Are gonna explain this to me or?”

“You’ll see.” I assured her ending the call.

I walked out into the room to join the others, Makoto clamped a hand on my shoulder and smiled, “You’re an old friend of Haru’s right? Nice to meet you I’m Makoto.” His voice was soft spoken and kind, the sort of voice you could fall asleep to or in love with, not that I had any plans to but, I let myself look him over again, but you totally could and without much trouble.

“Rin,” I said taking his outstretched hand, “Sup.” It wasn’t a question it was a statement, I was acknowledging his introduction not actually showing interest in what he was doing.

Haru looked at both of them and then at the door, his way of saying it was time to go.

“Has he always been a man of so few words?” Makoto asked with a soft smile.

“Yeah,” I looked at Haru, thinking back to a past I hadn’t thought of in a long time, “he has.”

“That’s good.” He chuckled softly beside me as we followed Haru out of the building, “I was beginning to think someone had broken his heart.”

“No.” _But he broke mine._ I quickly reminded myself he hadn’t in fact “broken my heart” no I’d done that to myself, but it was a hell of a lot easier to blame him.

Haru turned around then, “I can hear you, you know?”

Makoto smiled, “I know.”

“Then why do you keep doing it?”

“I wanna get to know your friend.”

“Then why don’t you try asking him about himself?”

Makoto laughed, “Good idea, so Rin, you were in a swimming club with Haru as kids right?”

“Yep, back in elementary school. We were eleven.”

“I’d love to see pictures of that! Baby Haru,” he seemed to think for a moment, “how cute would that be?”

Jealousy, once again, was being a fucking bitch, but I just laughed, “When did you two meet?”

“Eighth grade. A few years after you left.” Haru answered for him which surprised me.

Matoko smiled at him and pointed up ahead, “There it is!” Matoko said announcing our arrival at our destination. I looked around the modern style building, spotting Gou’s vibrant red ponytail even at a distance, I waved at her as she jogged towards us, a bright smile bringing her face to life, though as she noticed who accompanied me her expression switched from the comforting sisterly smile to something bubblier and a little creepy that she often referred to as _fangirling._

She came to a stop before us her eyes wide and her mouth fell slightly agape, before she remembered to close it, “Uh…hi!” she stumbled over the simple words.

“Gou,” I said with an amused smile, “you’re drooling.”

That earned me a slap on the arm and a quick ‘shut up’ before she actually decided to introduce herself, “Hi! I’m Kou,” she used the name she preferred which made me laugh because no one would ever actually call her that, “Rin’s sister.”

Matoko smiled, “It’s nice to meet you Kou.”

Haru looked at her momentarily, “I thought your name was Gou?”

“Uh…I’m well…I mean…what?” the confusing was obvious across her soft features so I stepped in to explain.

“That _is_ her name,” I said with a smirk, “and Gou come on, tell me you remember Haru?”

“Haru? You mean Haruka? As in Nanase?”

“No Haruka as in Sailor Uranus, yes Nanase.” The sentence was thickly coated in sarcasm.

“Oh my god!” Suddenly her arms were around his neck, “Haru! It’s been ages!”

The green fucking monster reared its ugly head, clearly it wasn’t okay for anyone to touch, look at, or say anything about Haru, okay dully noted.

Haru stood very still as if he’d been confronted by some wild animal, “Hello Gou.” He said calmly.

“You’re in the same dorm? Wow! How did that even happen? Must be fate!” she said as she pulled away from Haru.

_Fate or gods way of shitting on my life._

“This is so exciting!” Gou continued, “You two will get to swim together again!”

Haru’s face visibly lit up, though I couldn’t tell whether it was swimming with me or just swimming that had done it.

“I’m sure that’ll be nice.” Matoko interjected with a kind smile, that made me wanna punch him in the way where someone is so nice and perfect and has everything you want that you don’t know whether you hate them or love them.

“Yes,” Haru said looking at me his face holding one of those barely there Haru smiles, “I’m looking forward to it.”

“We should go get a table,” Gou said holding the door opened for us.

Makoto clearly wasn’t going to allow that, like it was against his, mister-perfect-human morals or something and ended up taking the door from her.

……

Dinner was actually surprisingly comfortable, Gou talked the most, but Haru and I seemed to fall back into our old ways easily, we laughed at old memories, I cracked a few jokes that earned me small smiles and once even a stifled laugh, Haru talked as little as possible per the usual and ate as much mackerel as he could get his hands on. I decided I did in fact like Makoto despite the fact he was mister-perfect-human and clearly knew Haru just as well, possibly better, than I did.

I found out Makoto had an excellent back stroke, and that Haru only swam free, though that was barely news to anyone who’d known Haru longer than ten minutes. Makoto explained how he’d gotten Haru to join the team and also how he had a TV and Xbox he was planning to hook up in the living area if that was okay with everyone. Which it was. Like really really okay. We talked briefly about our other roommates, I mentioned Nitori was really nice, and how Rei and Nagisa were a thing.

“By a thing, you mean like…boyfriends?” Gou asked careful with her words.

“Uh…” I was suddenly aware her reaction was going to be something important to my future, “yeah.”

“Oh. My. God.” Gou said and then she squealed, “That is so cute! How adorable is that! I bet they’ve been training together and aww, they’re going to the Olympics together, how romantic is that?”

I had trouble finding my words after that, luckily Matoko saved me, “Very, I think it’s great, ya know Rei was a track guy back when they met? Nagisa actually taught him how to swim. He only swims butterfly, but apparently it’s a pretty great butterfly. It’s really sweet Rei changed his whole athletic career for Nagisa, he didn’t have to, I mean would you?”

“Give up swimming for a relationship? Uh…” I wasn’t sure. Maybe…if it was an important relationship…maybe if it was Haru.

“No.” Haru said simply.

I glanced at him, slightly offended but then I remembered I had no reason to be, he wasn’t my boyfriend. He wasn’t supposed to say yes. He had no reason to consider my feelings on the subject. No obligation to conform to my beliefs. He was his own person with no personal strings tied to my life aside from our short and previously rekindled friendship that shouldn’t have had any influence what so ever on an answer like that. I took a deep breath as Gou continued to fawn over Nagisa and Rei and demanded she meet them as soon as possible, Haru turned his attention back to his mackerel, and Makoto, who proved to be just as much of a fangirl as Gou, indulged in my sisters antics with wide grins and excited laughs.

It wasn’t until thirty minutes later Gou announced that she had to get going because apparently all the coaches had a meeting at six-am tomorrow and Gou had to go as part of her internship. She hugged us all quickly, and kissed me on the cheek, before skipping out of the sushi bar. “Sorry about her.” I said after a few seconds.

Makoto’s eyes were glued to the door she’d just bounced out of, “Don’t be,” his eyes quickly switched to meet mine accompanied by a kind smile, “she’s nice.” He then pushed himself up from the table, “I think I’m gonna head back, you guys coming?”

I started to get up, but I felt Haru’s hand tug me back down, I tried desperately to ignore my eradicating heart, as I managed a muffled, “What the?” I looked to Haru for answers, but he was looking at Matoko.

“We’ll see you back at the dorm.” Was all he said.

Makoto smiled fondly, and nodded, “See you later then, have fun.” Makoto waved and headed outside the restaurant without another word.

I looked at Haru and raised an eyebrow questioningly, “Mind explaining?”

“I want to swim.” He said as if it was the only explanation needed.

“Swim? Didn’t you do that like, two hours ago?”

“No, I want to swim with you.”

_Deep breaths._ I reminded myself mainly to keep my heart from exploding, “Me?”

“We used to swim together as kids, and besides the competitive swimmer training center is right next door.”

_1…2…3…1…2…3…breathe,_ “Is it even opened?”

“Twenty four hours for swimmers.”

_Breathe before you pass the hell out._ “Uh…” I guess I took too long to answer because he spoke again.

“Come on Rin, swim with me and I’ll show you a sight you’ve never seen before.”

_Oh fuck it breathing is too mainstream anyway heart attacks are the new sexy._ He was actually fucking quoting me, that little pretentious shit, fuck him and his excellent memory. I felt like I was melting, what the fuck? Breathing was useless at this point I was pretty sure my heart was lodged somewhere in my neck and my lungs were shriveled into oblivion. After about six whole minutes and chugging half a glass of water I finally found my confidence again. I smirked flashing him my teeth and sideways glance, “I always have loved a challenge, I’ve seen a lot,” I leaned closer, “good luck showing me that sight.”

He let me hover near him for a moment before standing up, “Luck has nothing to do with it.” He said calmly leading the way to the center. We had to scan our ID’s at the door to gain access to the building, it was a huge building, the outer walls were white painted with the red silhouettes of swimmers in various positions. The pools were all on the second floor, each in a room covered by floor to ceiling windows to allow natural light in during the day, the water was kept illuminated by the pool lights, but other than that it seemed there was no artificial lighting, I didn’t mind, the glow was bright enough where you could see and dim enough to be relaxing. There was no one else there, probably because it was the first day and even Olympic athletes needed their off days, I had to admit I was happy for that too, I wasn’t exactly dressed for swimming, I was pondering this when I heard a zipper unzipping, which pulled me the hell out of my thoughts and threw me head first back into a reality in which Haruka Nanase was standing before me stripping his pants off. My breath caught in my throat as he shoved his pants down to reveal a fitted black bathing suit that I immediately recognized. _Oh my fucking god why does he own twelve of those?_ I wanted to hit myself for being liking the idiot, but refrained from it, watching him pull his loose gray v-neck over his head and discard it on the ground, I officially no longer wanted to hit myself for liking him…he was perfect. Every single feature of his perfectly chiseled body was perfect. Fucking perfect. Was I being redundant? Yes, hella redundant, but I didn’t give a shit. It needed to be said, no it needed to be shouted from roof tops, _Haruka Nanase was perfect._

He stood beside the pool looking at me, “Are you gonna swim in that?” he asked.

I shrugged and tugged at the dark fabric of my shirt, “Well, I didn’t exactly bring anything else…”

“It’s not like I’m gonna judge you for swimming in your underwear or anything. Can’t say I haven’t done it.” I scoffed. _I don’t doubt that statement for a second._

I shrugged and did as I was instructed, unbuttoning my black shirt and tossing it to the ground on top of his clothes, I kept my eyes on his the whole time, unzipping my pants and stepping out of them leaving me in just black boxers. I could feel a blush rising to my cheeks, but ignored it stepping onto the starting block in the lane next to his, I looked into his eyes red mixing with blue, “On your mark…”

He smirked, “Get set.”

One final look at him, “Go.”

We were in the water before I knew it, I felt it wash over my skin, soak into my hair, I moved in the direction on the opposite wall, my movements swift, precise, practiced. I was speeding through the water like it was where I belonged. I managed to sneak a peek at Haru once when I came up for air. He moved so beautifully, slicing through the water like a perfectly sharpened knife, with precision and accuracy I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to achieve. His body moved as naturally as mine did through water. We’d always pretended to be sea creatures as kids, him the dolphin, me the shark, but I never imagined I could feel closer to my animal doppelganger than I did in that moment. I wasn’t Rin racing Haru, I was a shark, racing a dolphin. After the first lap my hand seemed to hit the other wall faster than it ever had before. I burst through the water gasping for air only to find Haru doing the same thing in the exact same time frame.

Once he caught his breath he looked at me, a smile spread across his face. “Did you see it?”

I thought for a moment, though I knew exactly what he meant, I panted, “Yeah…I saw it.”

He allowed himself a short laugh and splashed water at me playfully.

“Oh you asshole.” I said with a widening grin, splashing him back. And then suddenly we were kids again, splashing around in a pool without a care in the world. Laughter filled the once quiet pool room with joyous music.

We went back and fourth splashing each other each time laughing harder than the last until finally a security guard came in and asked us to quiet down, we apologized, snickering as soon as the door shut behind him, we dragged ourselves out of the pool and pulled on our clothes which were pretty much soaked from our splash war, we were half way back to the dorm, talking about nothing and everything all at once when Haru stopped and looked at me a crooked half smile on his face, “I’m really glad you’re back Rin, I missed you.”

My heart imploded, “I am too, Haru. Really, really glad.”

Haru looked at me for a long second and then broke into a run, I rolled my eyes, laughed, and muttered, “Fucking Christ.” Before chasing Haru all the way back to our dorm, a warm smile on my face the entire way there.


	3. Allegiant

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Almost kissing, Ereri references, future films, and hipster fashion montage because I can.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOAH I'M ON A ROLL THIS WEEK! It's not even Sunday yet wow! But I promise regardless you'll still be getting a new chapter on Sunday, I just had a shit ton of inspiration (most of that being Gou not gonna lie).
> 
> Okay okay okay ya know the drill my tumblr is: oswwinoswald, my anime blog is: aloisearltrancy if ya wanna post fan art or reviews or anything tag it: fic: alienation or oswwinoswald or oswwinoswald fic
> 
> Please remember to leave kudos and if you have already don't that maybe you'd leave a quick comment? Even if it's just "i like it" all the comments help me write quicker. If you really like it subscribe or bookmark the fic. Anyway thanks sooooo very much for reading! xoxo Jess

The weeks that followed our swim were amazing. The friendship between Haru and I grew to the point where we were almost always together. I’d gotten to know the others better as well, Nitori and I had taken to spending every morning at the café next to our dorm, I learned that he was the youngest of five siblings, he had an older brother and three older sisters, who were all athletic in some way, apparently two of his sisters were here for volleyball and his oldest sister and brother had been in the 2012 Olympics, which obviously put a lot of pressure on Nitori to succeed, but even with all that weight on his shoulders he was the kindest person on the planet, he helped me with my times, shared his food with everyone in the dorm, and always had the sweetest smile on his face. So alas although sometimes he talked too much for his own good, Ai and I became fast friends. He could even deal with my mood swings, which earned him bonus points, but still no one dealt with me better than Haru. When I was pissy Haru ignored it, or laughed, or just asked me if I wanted to go swimming, I always said yes, swimming with Haru had become somewhat therapeutic for me, but then swimming with Haru would be therapeutic for anyone.

I sighed and looked at Nitori over my coffee, he smiled cheerfully as soon as he noticed, “Ai,” it was a nickname I’d given him, “are you going to that party Saturday?”

“The one Mikoshiba-senpai is throwing?”

“Yeah, he invited us, _and Gou_.” I added the end, the reason I wanted to go was to make sure no one touched my little sister. The amount of attention she been getting from the guys on the swim team was annoying to say the least.

Nitori giggled, “I think he likes her.”

“Shut up.”

“No, but seriously, I can see why, she’s cute,” he was trying to push my buttons before adding, “she looks just like you after all.”

I blushed at the complement, it had become apparent in the previous weeks that Nitori had something of a crush on me, it was cute, didn’t bother me at all, in fact at times when Haru seemed like an impossible goal I’d thought about indulging the idea, but decided against it, remembering that it wasn’t the fantastically straight Haru that was the problem, not that it wasn’t _a_ problem, but the fact that I was likely to lose my mother if I were ever to be myself, I shook my head forcing the blush from my cheeks, “Are you saying the reason half the guys on the swim team want to fuck my sister is because they actually want to fuck me, but they’re straight so she’s the next best thing?”

Nitori laughed, “That is exactly what I’m saying.”

“Dully noted, I think instead of buying them Christmas presents now I’ll just kiss them, take away a year worth of sexual frustration.”

“Good idea.” He laughed, glancing down at his phone before flashing me the screen, “You have somewhere to be.” He reminded me thoughtfully.

“Shit.” I whispered sharply, twenty minutes late, I prayed to god Makoto hadn’t done my job for me, it’d make my day so much less interesting. I waved goodbye to Nitori who just smiled at me and went on sipping his coffee nonchalantly as I made my way out of the coffee shop and into our residential building as quickly as possible, traipsing up the stairs, nearly tripping quite a few times. I made it to the dorm five minutes later opening the door to see Nagisa’s cheerful face flipping pancakes onto an awaiting plate and droopy eyed Rei nearly drooling into his coffee. I stifled a laugh, and made my way to Haru’s room, bursting through the door with a wicked grin on my face.

“Gooooooooooooooood morning!” I shouted with the audacity of an American talk show host.

Haru groaned audibly and stuffed his pillow over his face, “ _Rin._ ” His voice was pleading, laced with sleep, and it went straight to my groin. Damn him and my fetish for morning sex. I tried my best to ignore it, though it was hard to get past his beautifully disheveled appearance.

“Don’t Rin me, I’m even late today, you’ve slept long enough.”

“Why do you have to tease me like that? I thought I was safe from you,” his next words were laced with acid, “ _morning people._ ”

Poor Haru was the only person in our entire dorm who liked to sleep late. Everyone else was up and about by six and on Saturdays not later than seven-thirty, though it was possible from his usual morning demeanor there had been a time when Rei too had liked to sleep in, but clearly Nagisa saw to it that didn’t happen.

“Oh you love us.” I said making my way over to his bed and plopping down beside him.

He moved over just enough to make room for me, but kept his eyes closed, “No. No. I don’t.” he mumbled. He was so fucking cute.

“Sure ya do.” I encouraged.

“I tolerate you.” He said turning his back towards me. That just wasn’t happening. _Nope. Absolutely not. Rude little shit_. I pushed his shoulder back down on the mattress and climbed over him, straddling his waist. Haru, of course, thought this was all just a heterosexual best friend trying to wake up his also heterosexual best friend, but to me it was a bit more intimate then that, I’d never tell Haru that obviously, but…yeah. I grabbed the pillow covering his face and pried it away, he immediately he recovered his face with his hands and groaned, “You’re heavy…” he said completely unconvincingly.

“You’re still not awake.” I countered with a grin.

Another groan escaped Haru’s lips, sending more blood down south, “Why don’t I lock my door?” he asked himself.

“Because Makoto is scared of being trapped by a fire.” I answered with a grin, it was true after all, that was one of our little Mako’s worst fears.

“I need to request a room change…”

“Well I’m sure you and Nitori would hit it off,” I looked at Haru’s dirty clothes scattered across the floor, “you’re about equal in cleanliness.”

“ _Clean freak.”_ He growled through a yawn.

I moved my face closer to his, “What was that, brat?”

“Clean. Freak.”

Our faces were just inches apart now, I could feel his breaths on my lips, his eyes were locked with mine, beautiful and blue, I could feel his muscles tense, as I inched closer. Why wasn’t he pulling away? Why hadn’t he pushed me off him yet?

As if on cue he started struggling to get out from under me. I began laughing immediately drawing away, “You’re an idiot.” I said in between laughs as I rolled off of him.

“You almost kissed me…” Haru looked genuinely concerned.

I snorted brushing off his accusation like it was nothing, “As if, who’d ever want to kiss you?”

He rolled his eyes and pushed me off the bed, I landed on the floor where I stayed laughing for a few more minutes as Haru stumbled around his room, pulling on a pair of jeans and a stripped blue and white tee as he went along. His hair was still a mess from sleep when he nodded towards the door a minute later, “Are you gonna stay on the floor like an idiot all day or…?”

I pushed myself to my feet and followed him into the living area, Rei looked a bit less dead now, I noticed his coffee cup was empty, Nagisa was diving face first into a short stack grinning wildly, and the previously missing Makoto was sitting on the couch with Gou who must have arrived during Haru’s daily wake up call. She smiled when she saw me, “Finally get him up?” she chimed happily.

“Finally.” I replied, purposely throwing myself onto the couch between Mako and Gou. Out of all the boys on the team he was the one I’d have personally chosen for my sister, but that didn’t mean he was allowed to look at her, talk to her, or touch her, ever. Same concept as Haru, expect more frantically because Haru, while he did have quite a few girls lined up to date him, wasn’t: 1, my baby sister, or 2, my baby sister.

Makoto pretended like he didn’t know exactly what I was doing and looked to Haru who’d started washing out Nagisa’s pancake pan and began prepping it for his morning dose of mackerel, “I think we’re almost out of mackerel Haru, you and Nitori need to go shopping.”

Another thing that’d been established throughout the dorm, Haru and Nitori were the grocery shoppers. We’d all tried our hand at it, but those two were the only ones who ever got the right things.

“Noted,” Haru said blandly, “but Nitori has his private evaluation with Sensei Gorou until four so I’ll have to go by myself.”

“I’ll go along.” Makoto said sweetly, “It’s individual evaluation week anyway so I’m not busy.”

 _Damn him I was gonna volunteer,_ my brain shouted although the rest of me was pretty calm about it. Haru nodded and went about cooking the last bit of mackerel and I turned my attention to Gou, “So how’s the internship?”

She groaned, “Relentless, but luckily I have this week off other than a few errands, Ama-chan is doing her evaluations this week just like Gorou so she doesn’t need much help.”

My sister had been helping both swim coaches non-stop since her first day. I was happy she’d be off, but not so happy she was off the same week as Mikoshiba’s party.

“Gosh Gou they’ve had you working non-stop.” Makoto interjected, “I bet you’re happy to have a week off.”

“Yeah! I really am! I was thinking of going to see a movie later actually, just to relax, you guys should come too!” She was talking to all of us, “We could catch the matinée if we hurry, I mean you guys need to get dressed and stuff, but it’d be fun if you’re interested.”

Makoto smiled, I held my breath, _He wouldn’t._ “Count me in.”

 _Of course he would._ I sighed, now I had to fucking go because if it was just them it’d be a date and that was a huge no. “Haru and I will tag along too.”

Haru stopped cooking his fish and looked over at me, “Hmm?”

“The movies, with Gou and Makoto, this afternoon.”

“No.”

I rolled my eyes, “Come on Haru, live a little.”

“Will there be water?”

His infatuation with water well adorable was proving to be quite the hassle, “Probably not?”

“Then no.”

“There might be water _in_ the movie.”

“Rin…” he said my name like he doubted my statement.

I just smiled at him, “ _Haru_.” I mocked his tone.

“I don’t think—“

Gou stepped in, “It’s alright Makoto and I can jus—“

“No! No no no. No. No, it’s fine Haru’ll come around.”

“Uh…” she sat back in her chair, giving me a strange look, “okay…but if he doesn’t want to…”

“He does. He just doesn’t know he does yet.”

“Um alright.” She said, her expression not changing, she looked towards Nagisa and Rei, “What about you guys?”

Nagisa smiled, “We’d love to Gou-san!”

Rei choked on his third cup of coffee, “We would?”

“Yep! We definitely would!”

Rei managed a smiled, “I guess we would then.”

“Great! That just leaves you Haru?” Gou said looking towards my friend with a smile that was softer than my usual grin.

“…No.”

“But Haru-chan! Everyone is going!” Nagisa said jumping up from his place at the breakfast bar and pulling on Haru’s shoulder. The face Haru made was laughable.

“Nitori isn’t—“

“Nitori is at his private evaluation.” Makoto and I reminded him at the same time.

“Cooooome on Haru-chan!” Nagisa chanted again. He eyed us and made a motion for us to join him and soon the whole room was chanting, “Come on Haru-chan! Come on Haru-chan! Come on Haru-chan!” quite loudly leaving Haru obviously annoyed.

“I’ll go if you stop.”

Seconds later the room fell silent.

“So you’re gonna come then?” I asked with a smirk.

“Fuck you.” Was his only response, and my own was a vibrant grin.

Within the next ten minutes it was decided we’d be seeing Allegiant, the third movie in the Divergent series, though Gou and Makoto were the only ones in our whole group who’d actually seen the other two movies, we’d agreed on the condition that it was the only good thing out and also because the movie started at 12:45 and Gou had deemed all the other times too late for her liking which meant the apartment full of sleepy pajama clad boys had one hour to get ready. Luckily for time’s sake Makoto and I had already showered and Haru had decided (and by decided I mean forcefully told) not to take a shower due to his habit of spending a literal hour in the shower, sometimes three or four, so only Rei and Nagisa had to take one, which never took too long. Though Makoto did decided to change out of his sweat pants and too big t-shirt he’d worn to bed and I ended up forcing Haru to brush his messy hair.

Miraculously by 12:30 we were all ready to go which was perfect timing seeing as it was a ten minute walk to the theater. The six of us probably looked like something out of a fashion magazine as we walked through the busy campus. I looked down the line, on my far left Gou was wearing a olive drab skater skirt and a floral crop top that read ‘BLOSSOM’ in thick chunky lettering, the look was accompanied by cream knee-highs and red flats, that matched her ever present red ponytail. Next to her was Makoto, he was dressed simply wearing one of his signature deep V-necked shirts, this particular one was white, he’d paired it with a tan boyfriend sweater and a pair of faded cuffed jeans, light brown Stanford’s topped off the look. Nagisa was skipping along beside Makoto wearing a letterman jacket with pink sleeves and blue and yellow accents, underneath he wore a white t-shirt bearing a cute cartoon penguin, and light wash blue jeans with pink high-tops. Rei’s outfit consisted of a white button down shirt paired with a loose red tie and a jean jacket. Haru who I thought looked the best out of them all hadn’t bothered to change out of yesterday’s jeans and the blue and white stripped top though he had managed to throw on a grey drawstring hoodie and vans. I personally wore the same outfit I had been at breakfast, a white V-neck covered with a grey vest and red skinny jeans, I’d also decided to wear a pinstriped fedora to make me look like even more of an asshole and I’d tied my hair back into a short ponytail. We were engaged in comfortable small talk as we approached the theater, everyone bought tickets, I waiting patiently behind Haru as he ordered his own, he patted his pockets, and yawned, alarm filling his eyes he turned to me and whispered, “I forgot my wallet.”

I laughed, “You’re joking?”

“Nope.” He said with a shrug.

“Oh my god, I guess I’ll buy your ticket then,” I said stepping up to the box office and quickly asking for two.

“Wow,” Haru said his eyes wide in false surprise, “almost kisses and movie tickets, watch out it’ll start to look like you like me.”

I rolled my eyes, _I do like you, asshole_. Is what I almost said, but alas I hadn’t any balls. “You wish.” I handed him the ticket, he leaned his head on my shoulder jokingly.

“You want to buy the pop-corn or should I?” he winked, “You _did_ buy the tickets after all, I think I should start pulling some weight in this relationship.”

 _I wish this was a fucking relationship_ , I thought hopefully, while I simultaneously muttered, “Oh shut up.”

“That’s not very nice. I think we should take a break.”

I laughed, “Probably for the best.”

“Probably.” He said, as we caught up to the others inside the theater. Of course, Nagisa and Rei sat next to each other hand in hand, Makoto and Gou sat on the end laughing together about one of the trailers, leaving Haru and I to sit in the middle, it was fine at first, until half way through the movie when I glanced over and noticed that Nagisa was slumped up against Rei their hands comfortably intertwined Nagisa’s eyes were glued to the film, but Rei’s were glued to Nagisa, and although he seemed to be paying attention it was evident by the smile on his face that Nagisa was well aware of what Rei was doing, I looked down at Gou and Makoto, his arm was around her shoulders and I immediately hoped to god he hadn’t done the cliché yawn-and-strategically-place-arm-around-hot-girl thing, she didn’t seem to mind though her eyes kept switching fondly from the screen to his face. I laughed before realizing this meant Haru and I were the only non-couple in our group, I leaned over to say something to him, before noticing that he was asleep. A smiled tugged at my lips, he was so fucking cute when he slept, a quiet laugh escaped my throat causing Haru to shift his position until he ended up leaning his head on my shoulder instead of his hand, I scooted closer closing the space between us so that he could comfortably lean on me. I felt his weight against me, he pressed his face into my shoulder and I heard him groggily mumble, “Rin…” Through his thick fog of sleep. I couldn’t suppress the smile this time, I leaned down and pressed a kiss to his hair before glancing back at the movie only to find Nagisa looking at me curiously, he raised an eyebrow, shrugged and then commenced watching the movie again.

 _Crap._  


	4. House Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Nagisa is the gay messiah, Haru get's drunk, and Rin gets in a fight, frozen peas are involved, and kissing. Lots of kissing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SUNDAY IS HERE! Whoooop! One quick thing, okay so I know I said this story would be updated every Sunday, but I've been writing so much for it it's getting updated a lot more frequently. So by Sunday I mean there WILL at least one if not more chapters uploaded every week before or on Sunday, if you want to have a schedule then know if you check only on Sunday there will always be a new chapter. Okay! Okay. Thanks!
> 
> Thanks for the nice comments and kudos I've been getting, I've also posted this story of fanfiction (though I prefer ao3 like hella) Thanks so very much! Please please please keep commenting and letting me know what you think it helps me so much, it really really does.
> 
> Follow me on tumblr at oswwinoswald or for anime at aloisearltrancy any reviews or fanart or anything of the sort can be tagged: oswwinosawald, oswwinoswald fic, and fic: alienation
> 
> QUICK TRIGGER: This chapter contains derogatory female slurs and implied rape. Be careful when reading. It isn't graphic, but I wanted to be safe.
> 
> Thanks so much! This is my favorite chapter so far! Enjoy!!

Nagisa didn’t say anything about what he saw in the theater, in fact I had started to think my worrying was in vain, until Friday night when he knocked on the door to my room, “Hey Rin-chan!” his voice was full of its usual excitement, “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

My heart pounded in my chest, no, no, no, please just ask me about practice or something, god no.

“Can I come in?” he pressed, with a soft smile.

I opened the door widely to allow him entrance, he shot me a smile and plopped down on Nitori’s bed with a soft thump. I closed the door, “What did you wanna talk about?” I already knew of course, but I was praying to god he was here for some other reason.

“You  actually, I didn’t want to bring it up around Haru or Rei even, because well I didn’t know what the situation was, but Rin-chan…are you gay?” His words were gentle, not threatening whatsoever, but that didn’t stop my heart from beating a million miles an hour or my palms from getting clammy. 

“Um…I…I’m not…I just…Uh…what? W-why would you? I mean…no.” _Smooth Rin. Smooth._

“Oh,” he looked unconvinced, “I just thought…I mean you…” he tilted his head to the side slightly and stared at me, “Do you kiss all of your friends then?”

“I…no?”

“Well you kiss Haru then?”

My heart needed to calm the fuck down, “What?”

“I saw you kiss his hair at the movies Wednesday…If you and him are a thing, I’m you can tell me…” he shrugged obviously thinking of Rei, “I’m not gonna judge you.”

“No! I mean, Haru and I are just friends…I…he’s not…It’s not like that.”

“Do you want it to be like that?”

I remained quiet for a long time, my mind was racing, yes. Yes of course I wanted it to be like that hell he was perfect, funny and sweet, sexy and somehow still adorable, who didn’t want that? Who would say no? _A straight guy._ I reminded myself. Straight people don’t want that. That isn’t how it works. God dammit, I was up the creek without a fucking paddle, I looked at Nagisa who awaited my answer patiently. Could I tell him? Could he help me? I took a deep breath, “It doesn’t matter what I want.”

“Maybe not,” Nagisa looked at me hopefully, “But that doesn’t answer my question.”

“…I…I don’t know okay…maybe?”

“Maybe?”

“Yeah, maybe, I guess I could possibly want that…”

“Rin…can you just say yes or no? I’m not gonna tell anyone, it’s between you and me.”

“Yes.” It was like a weight was lifted off my shoulders. I could breathe again. 

He smiled, “How long?”

My face felt hot, “Uh…always?”

“Always?”

“Since we were kids…I don’t remember the exact moment,” _Lie._ “but I know it was there.”

“Why haven’t you told him?”

My eyes widened, “Told him? Nagisa I can’t tell anyone! Especially not Haru, Haru can never, _ever_ , know about this. No one can. Not Gou, not Mako, not my mom. No one. I’d loose everything if anyone found out Nagisa. Everything. My family…Haru…that can’t happen…”

“Everything? Rin, I don’t think you need to worry about that.”

“What do you mean? Of course I do. Nagisa, my mom would kill me. She’d never even look at me again if she found out. I’d be disowned before I could even apologize…”

“Maybe you’re right…I mean I don’t know your mom. I don’t know how she would react, but I do know Gou, and Haru, and Makoto, and Rei, and Nitori…I know how they would react…and I promise you, you wouldn’t lose any of them over this.”

“Haru…I mean…he’s…he can’t know. He wouldn’t look at me the same way. He might be okay with it, but he’d…it’d be awkward.” I took a deep breath, “I don’t think you understand Nagisa, this isn’t a crush, I’m fucking in love with him. I haven’t been able to think about anyone else since I left him back when we were eleven, and seeing him again, being near him…it’s been…it’s been hell because you know what? He still doesn’t look at me the way I look at him. He still doesn’t care. Nothing has changed aside from our age, I’m still hopelessly in love with him and he’s still hopelessly in love with water…and I know that’s never going to change, and I swear to you I love that part of him, I swear I do, but it hurts to look at the person you’re in love with when they don’t even look at you.” I could feel myself starting to cry, “I don’t expect him to be in love with me. I don’t even expect him to think about me like that, that’s fine. I’m okay with that, but if he knew…everything would change, I wouldn’t even get to enjoy the little things. And god knows the little things are the only things I have.” Tears burned my cheeks as I dropped down onto my bed. 

Nagisa reached out and put a comforting hand on my thigh, “It’s alright Rin-Rin, I understand…I won’t tell him. I promise…if you want to keep it a secret then he’ll never know, but you should understand, everything isn’t as black and white as you think it is. I know it seems impossible, but there’s always a chance that he feels the same way…I know it sounds farfetched, but love isn’t always unrequited…he might be in the exact same boat as you Rin, maybe you just need to try tipping it and see where you end up?”

I doubted it. There was little to no chance Haru was in the same boat, but it felt good to say all the things that had been weighing on his heart for all those years. It felt good to get it off his chest. 

I looked down at the blond who was now crouching on the floor beside my bed, “Thanks.” I muttered, he knew I meant it. I could see it in his eyes, “For listening.”

Nagisa stood, patting my shoulder comfortingly, “Anytime, and for the record, I think Gou would love it, just an observation.”

I scoffed, “You’re probably right.”

“I’m one-hundred percent right.”

This drew a laugh from my lips, “Thanks Nagisa.”

“No problem Rin-chan!” he said skipping out of my room with a smile, I fell back on my bed more exhausted than I had been in a long, long time.

……

Saturday was spent mostly in preparation for Mikoshiba’s party. Gou had texted me nearly thirty times in the last hour asking me if I was going. I’d only replied to half of them. All with yes, but apparently she wanted to be absolutely sure I was coming. 

Makoto had convinced Haru to come, and Nitori had also agreed, meaning our whole dorm would be going, but we learned via social media sites it wasn’t our dorm who’d be going, but almost all the athletes on the facility. Luckily for the party goers Mikoshiba was one of the few members of the swim team who lived off campus, he shared a house with the other four members who’d elected to say off campus, not that far off, a ten minute drive at worst, but far enough not to break any rules.

It was eight when Gou knocked on our door, she wore a simple pair of black shorts and a sheer button up, I rolled my eyes when I saw her, “Put on some real fucking clothes.”

Gou crossed her arms, “It’s just a bra Rin, you act like you’ve never seen a bra before?”

_ Not intentionally. No.  _ “I have,” answered cooly, “but I sure as hell don’t wanna see yours thanks.”

“Then don’t look.”

“You’re such a brat.”

“You’re such a—“

Makoto appeared beside me cutting her off with a smile and a simple, “Gou, you look nice.”

She tilted her head to the side and raised her eyebrows as if to say ‘yeah asshole see, he thinks I look nice.’

I let out a exasperated sigh and flung myself down on the couch next to Nitori who was giggling at the whole interaction.

Gou sat down across from us, “Where’s everyone else?”

“Haru is getting dressed,” I explained trying to avoid the mental image, “and Nagisa and Rei left like three minutes before you got here, apparently Rei left his phone at the pool or something so they said they’d meet us there.”

“Sounds like a code for pool sex.” Gou said.

I watched as Mako and Nitori’s eyes widened and laughed, “Probably.”

Haru emerged from his room just as I said it throwing himself onto the couch between Nitori and I , “Probably what?”

“Rei and Nagisa left early to have sex not because he actually forgot his phone.”

Haru looked completely un-phased, “Oh definitely.”

“What?” Nitori spoke, his face was afire with blush, “How would you know?”

Haru reached behind him and pulled something out of the couch cushions, “Because I just sat on his phone.” He said producing Rei’s Blackberry.

Gou covered her mouth with her hand to stifle and laugh and I grinned at Mako and Nitori’s who were both a bright shade of scarlet.

“Can we just go?” Makoto said standing up quickly.

Gou giggled, “Sure we can.” She said pressing a kiss to Makoto’s blushing cheek, which only deepened his blush. I would have probably raised hell if I didn’t already feel bad for the guy.

She led the way out of the apartment and to the parking lot where the five of us piled into my sedan, Nitori, Gou, and Makoto in the back seat, me driving and Haru riding shotgun. 

When we finally arrived at the party, we were greeted by a grinning Miikoshiba who’s yellow eyes were glued to Gou, “Glad you guys could make it!” he said maintaining his prize winning smile.

“Thanks for inviting us!” Gou said with a cheery smile, Makoto gave Mikoshiba a follow up smile and Nitori also slipped in a thank you where Haru and I stayed silent considering I was only here to make sure no one touched my sister and he was only here because Makoto had told him he’d buy him a month’s supply of mackerel if he agreed. So yeah neither of us was entirely thrilled about our current situation.

The others sauntered off leaving just Haru and I leaning awkwardly against the stair rail watching the intoxicated young people bob to music, or make out, or fall over, or one of the thousand other things drunk people did. It looked fun actually, at that point I needed a release anyway, for some reason since I’d told Nagisa about my…feelings…towards Haru I’d managed to make nearly every interaction between the two of us just that much more awkward. “Want a drink?” I had to raise my voice so that he could hear me over the music.

“Sure.” He said, “I’ll come with you.”

We made our way to the kitchen where there was a collection of canned beers as well as a massive  keg and an abundance of red solo cups. We both opted for the keg, filling out cups, I watched as Haru took a sip, he choked a bit on the bitter taste and I laughed, “First drink?” I asked.

He nodded, no surprise there, “That obvious.”

“Yeah that disgusted face gave it away.”

“This stuff is awful.” He said glancing down at the liquid.

I raised my own cup to my lips and took a long drag, “Keep drinking, it begins to taste a hell of a lot better I swear.”

Haru shrugged and took another sip, and another, and another, and another, and three cups later he was drunk off his ass and I was having trouble doing anything, but laughing. _Lightweight._ I mused watching him as he took yet another sip from his fourth cup of cheap ass beer. 

“ _Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin_ ,” his breath was tainted with alcohol and his words were somewhat slurred, Haru reached for my face placing both his hands on either side of my face, “Rin, your teeth!” he seemed shocked by something.

I tried my hardest not to laugh, “What about them?” I asked, I was barely drunk at all, maybe a tad tipsy, but nowhere near Haru.

“They’re sharp!” 

I laughed flashing a grin, “Yeah they are.”

He giggled, “I like it!” he said his face inches from mine, usually my heart would have been racing, but at this exact moment I was having trouble doing anything, but laughing as the usually stoic Haru turned into quite the average party goer.

He danced, badly I might add, but he dance, and drank, and laughed wildly. “Dance with me Rin!” he grabbed my hand, pulling me towards the other dancers.

I shook my head, “I’m okay.”

“Riiiiin you have to dance.”

“No, I really don’t.”

“But you dooo, come on, pleaaaaase?”

“Nope.” Haru’s grip tightened on my hand.

“You’re gonna dance.”

“No I’m not.”

“Just one? One dance? Please, for me?”

“Why would I do anything to please you?”

“I don’t know,” he said looking a tiny bit confused, “but you’re gonna.”

I rolled my eyes, caving in and letting him pull me onto the dance floor. I proved to be a bit of a better dancer than my partner, but then again I wasn’t nearly as drunk. The dancers moving around us made sure we had little to no personal space, I was pressed up against Haru who was swaying to the rhythm of the music, or at least trying to, like the beautiful idiot he was. 

“See!” his voice was probably more cheerful than I’d ever heard it, “It’s fun.” He placed his hands on my hips then, but I wasn’t sure whether it had been on purpose or subconsciously. It didn’t matter, all that I knew was my heart was racing.

I laughed, “What am I gonna do with you, Haru?”

“You could,” he pulled me a tiny bit closer and looked up into my eyes, “you could kiss me?”

My heart stopped beating.

Legitimately stopped. 

In fact every fucking thing in my entire life stopped. 

My brain, my heart, the fucking earth.

I had to be dreaming. This was not possible.

“What?” I snapped so quickly I hadn’t even noticed I was alive yet.

Haru moved his hands from my hips snaking them up into my hair, “You could kiss me.”

“I…” he leaned closer, his lips hovering just over mine when a loud crash rang though the room followed by the sound of my sisters voice over the music. Dammit. Damn fucking everything. I was so fucking close. I knew I couldn’t do it now. I had to go find Gou, and I wasn’t even sure Haru knew what he was doing right now…it was probably for the best.

I told Haru to stay put before running of in the direction of the crash just in time to see Mikoshiba baring his fists at some other guy from the team Gou cowered behind him, “Don’t you fucking look at her do you understand me?” Mikoshiba shouted demanding the other guys attention.

“What you get to lay claim to her? You think she’s yours for the taking because you’re the captain?”

“That isn’t it! What you did was borderline rape!”

At that point Gou had noticed me, and started towards me, her arms encircled my waist she buried her face into my shirt, I noticed she was crying.

My arms went around her automatically, “Gou, what’s wrong? What happened?”

She sniffled, “…Akio…he uh…he…he tried to…” she was sobbing into my shirt.

My heart broke. Who the fuck thought it was okay to ever _ever_ in a fucking million years put their filthy hands on my sister without her consent? Who the hell did this guy think he was? I was gonna kill him. I was gonna tear him limb from limb and then feed him to sharks. I raised my voice, “WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO TO HER?”

“I didn’t do shit!” the guys said spitting on the floor, “I was just having some fun.”

“ _Fun_? Did she say it was okay to have _fun_?”

“Bitch didn’t say anything! What are you another one of her fucking boyfriends? Or are you _the_ boyfriend, ya should know that whore has a ton.”

Gou winced, “Excuse you asshole, this is my fucking little sister. Don’t you dare fucking talk about her that way.”

“She’s clinging to like you like she clings to every other guy on the planet.”

I felt Gou sob against me, “I do not!” she said, “I do not! I don’t even have a boyfriend!” she shouted.

I soothed her hair with my hand, “It’s okay Gou.” I said softly.

“Ya gonna fight me or you gonna sit there like a fucking pussy?” the guy pressed stepping toward me, just as he did Mako pushed his was through the crowd.

“What the hell happened?” he asked, a bewildered expression on his face.

“Oh look another of her boyfriends!” Akio jested.

“Shut the hell up about her!” Mikoshiba shouted, “You don’t even know her!”

“Mako.” I said as calmly as possible, “Please…take Gou home. Call a taxi, take the bus, walk just get her out of here.” 

She sniffled again, “I don’t wanna go without you…I don’t…you’re the only person I trust right now…” I could see the pain in her eyes as I looked at her.

“Mako won’t hurt you, Gou. I promise, he’d never hurt you. I wouldn’t let you go with him if I thought there was even a slight chance he’d do anything you didn’t want. I need to take care of this asshole, and I promise I’ll come see you as soon as I’m done here. I swear, but you need to get out of here like right now, okay?”

She balled her hands into the fabric of my shirt, “I…o-okay…”

I hugged her to my chest again and looked at Mako, “Take her home, ours, hers I don’t really care just one of the two, call me as soon as she’s there okay?”

He nodded, “Of course.” He said, touching Gou on the shoulder lightly, she looked at me one last time, before moving to Mako, letting him warp her arms around her shoulders, and usher her out the front door.

“Hey!” Akio shouted, “Where ya going little bitch! I’m not done with you!” 

“Like hell you are.” I said throwing a punch, hitting the guy square in the jaw. Chants of ‘fight!’ erupted around us, I landed another punch, he swung at me, missing my face, but managing to get my shoulder pretty bad, I threw another punch raising his left shoulder, I managed a sharp jab to his ribs before he finally got my face, I felt the skin of my lip tear on impact and used my arm to deflect the next blow, at that point Mikoshiba stepped in to help finish him off, we beat him unconscious and I probably wouldn’t have stopped if Mikoshiba hadn’t pulled me off of him. I tugged out of his hold, just as my phone rang, Makoto’s name flashed across the screen and I answered immediately, “Hello?” I said hoping Gou was okay.

“I brought her back to our place. I don’t know what happened, she wouldn’t say anything, but she’s exhausted, I laid her down in my bed,” I heard him move a little on the other end like he’d switched hands, “she’s asleep now…you don’t need to worry, she’s been through something terrible I’m sure, but she’s not doing any talking tonight. I’d say hurry home, but it doesn’t matter either way, she’s passed out, she won’t know, but I bet you wanna be here huh?”

I nodded although I knew he couldn’t see me, “I’ll try and find Haru and Nitori and get going as soon as possible.”

“Okay,” he said calmly, “see you soon.”

“Thanks Mako.”

“No problem at all.”

He ended the call. 

I made my way back to where’d Haru and I had been dancing earlier my heart skipping a beat as I remember his request. _You could kiss me._ The words rang through my head, ricocheting, forming echoes, throughout my brain. I scanned the crowed for him, maybe I could still get that kiss? God know it would improve the shitty night I’d had, but as my eyes found their way to Haru, I found that my night just kept getting shittier. There he was…dancing in the arms of some girl, their lips matted together like wet hair. I wanted to vomit. I felt like I might actually. My head was spinning.

All I could think to do was grab the closest drink and chug. Drink away the image. Drink away the feelings. Drink away the entire god damn night. My lip was bleeding from where Akio had punched me as I drank, countless beverages, some that I’d just picked up off side tables and counter tops, I managed finally to forget. To stop feeling. I was dancing through the crowd nursing another beer when I ran into Nitori, “Rin?” he looked worried, “Rin oh my god areyou bleeding?”

I took a swig of my beer, “I think so…I don’t remember…I was…?”

“God dammit,” he took the drink from me. “How much have you had?”

“…Twenty? Thirty? I dunno…lost count after twenty-six.”

“Twenty six? Rin why the hell would you drink twenty-six beers?

I pouted at the lack of beer in my hand, “To forget.”

“Forget what?” Nitori asked, he looked genuinely concerned, I’m sure he had a good reason to be, but I honestly didn’t give one flying fuck at the moment. 

“Stuff.” I answered simply, reaching for my drink.

He hit my hand away, “No. You’ve had enough, come on, I need to fix that lip.”

I groaned, “ _Oh my god.”_

He dragged me into the kitchen, opening the freezer and retrieving a bag of frozen peas, and grabbing a rag from the sink, he pulled my face up gently, dabbing the cloth against my swollen lip carefully, “How did this happen?” he asked.

I shrugged, the details were fuzzy. 

He shot me a sad smile and pressed the bag of peas to my lips, “Keep that there, I’m gonna get you some water, you need to sober up.” 

I did as I was told, he returned a minute later with a  glass of water and some aspirin, “I don’t want that.” I mumbled hitting his hand away.

“You need to take it…”

“No I don’t. I don’t wanna.”

“Then what do you want?” he said setting down the glass of water and the pills of the counter.

“I just…” I felt something crash over me, that dreaded image of Haru from earlier flashed through my head, “I just want to feel loved…”

“What? Rin what are you talking about?”

“Kiss me.” The words left my lips before I could stop them.

“You’re drunk.”

I ignored him leaning in and pressing my lips against his, the kiss was frenzied. I ran my hands up, knotting them into his lavender hair, as I forced my tongue into his mouth, he groaned against my lips, I couldn’t tell whether it was of pleasure or protest, but he didn’t pull away, his hands encircled my waist and he pulled me into him, kissing me back in a way I certainly didn’t deserve to be kissed. Not right now anyway…possibly not ever, I knew I should stop, pull away, or something, but I couldn’t. I needed the warmth Nitori offered. I could pretend he was someone else…I could pretend I was kissing Haru, he’d never know, I just…I just needed someone…Anyone…to just like me. To want to kiss me back. To want to be with me. Just one fucking person. And even if Nitori wasn’t that exact person, he was good enough. Anyone was good enough. A one legged French prostitute would have sufficed in that moment. I kept kissing him, my hands trailing along his body, stopping at the waist band of his jean, I tugged there, and he pulled away. “No Rin.”

Sober me probably would have understood, but drunk me was confused as fuck, “…I thought you liked me?”

A smile twitched on his lips, “I do.”

“But…not enough?”

He shook his head, “God no, I promise I like you enough…I swear…but Rin, you’re drunk. Like really really drunk and in the morning you’re not gonna feel this way.” 

“How do you know?” I captured his lips again, “I might.”

“You won’t…Rin it’s pretty obvious…I mean, it’s obvious I’m not the person you want to be kissing right now.”

“Yes you are.” I insisted.

“No. No I’m really not. We both know that…” he pulled away from me for good this time, “Where are your keys?” he asked.

I dug through my pockets and handed them over.

He pocketed them, “Stay right here Rin. Drink that water, take those pills, I’m gonna go find Haru. Don’t move.”

I nodded, and watched him disappear through the crowd, it took a minute, but I did in fact take the pills and drink the glass of water. It cleared my head a bit, and I immediately started to feel like a fucking asshole for doing what I did to Nitori. I thought about Gou and how she needed me, and cursed myself for being so damn selfish. 

Twenty minutes later Nitori pushed me down onto my bed, I groaned, feeling the beginnings of a massive headache, and an even worse emotional toll.

 

_ Never again.  _ I swore myself to a life of sobriety, _Never fucking again._


	5. If I Ever Leave I Could Learn to Miss You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lots of confessions, a fight, and a choice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SUNDAY!!!!!!!!! <3 Hella! We have arrived! Okay hi! The new chapter is titled, "If I Ever Leave I Could Learn to Miss You" from Trade Mistakes by Panic! At The Disco. Mainly because in this chapter Rin has to make a choice which may result in distancing himself from a certain person. This chapter gets a bit deep a few times. Sorry!! Hopefully you like it though, I did. 
> 
> Thanks for reading and be sure to leave comments or kudos if you haven't even short little comments make all the difference <3 
> 
> Follow me on tumblr at: oswwinoswald or for anime at: aloisearltrancy if you want to say something or post something to go along with the fic I track the tags: oswwinoswald, fic: alienation, and oswwinoswald fic
> 
> Thanks soooo much again for all the support! <3

The next morning the dorm was filled with the sounds of post-party-vomiting, pills being distributed, and tired groans. It was around eleven before I even thought of getting out of bed, my head was throbbing, and I’d vomited three times, but finally after about twenty aspirin I was feeling good enough to start the day. Nitori and Makoto, who’d barely had anything to drink, were acting as our nurses, bringing us pills and hot tea which was much appreciated. Thank god it was Sunday and there was no practice because I was pretty sure I could hear other members of the team gallantly throwing up through the walls.

After a fit of groans and three failed attempts at standing up I made my way into the living room, none of my roommates were lounging about like they usually were I figured they were either too sick or busy with their other charges, but I did notice Gou was slumped up against the couch in an oversized t-shirt staring into her tea with a rather lost expression.

“Gou?” I said sitting down beside her.

She didn’t even look at  me, she just curled into my side and tucked her head in the crook of my neck, “I’m sorry.” She sniffed.

“Why are you sorry? You didn’t do anything.”

“I…I ruined your night.”

I scoffed pressed a brotherly kiss to her hair, “You didn’t ruin anything, I was there to keep assholes away you remember?” I paused regretting some of my choices from the evening, “I did a pretty shitty job, I guess.”

She shook her head, “No you didn’t…I’m just…I…I should have listened to you when you told me to put on clothes, I should have—“

“No Gou, I was joking, you looked great, and besides what you put on your body is your choice, you shouldn’t have to worry about whether or not it’s safe for you to dress how you want to dress. That guy was an asshole, and he got the shit beaten out of him because of it, but you didn’t do anything wrong.”

“But…I…”

“Look at me, Gou.” I turned so that she could see my face, “You didn’t do anything wrong. This is not your fault. At all. Do you wanna press charges? Because if you do we’ll go up there right now and—“ she cut me off.

“No. No…let’s just…I just wanna forget about this.”

I nodded, “Fine by me.” I pulled at the fabric of the yellow shirt she was wearing, “Where’d this come from?”

She moved a bit to look down revealing a rather contorted looking penguin, “Makoto let me borrow it… he was really sweet last night.”

I laughed, “He’s really sweet all the time Gou. He’s like the nicest person on the planet.”

She smiled softly, “I know…”

“Do you like him?” I nudged her playfully.

“Maybe...” she giggled, “I mean I think I do…but he…he’d never—“

“Don’t even say he’d never like you back because I’m ninety-percent sure he already does and also I mean look at you, you’re the spitting image of me and everyone knows I’m hot as hell so you’ve got that going for you.” I joked, earning me a playful slap.

“I hate you.”

“I love you too.” I told her.

“Sorry about your lip.”

“Sorry about you’re night.”

She shrugged, “What can ya do?”

“Sadly not much.” I muttered, as Nitori came into the room, he avoided eye contact, but smiled in our general direction.

“Do you want some tea?” he asked me, heading towards the kitchenette.

“Sure.”

“Two sugars and milk?”

“You know me so well.” I bragged, a few minutes later I was handed a cup of tea.

“You should go see Haru when you finish that, he keeps thinking I’m you, I think he has it the worst out of all of you guys.”

I would’ve laughed if the image of him kissing that girl hadn’t popped into my head, instead I managed a halfhearted smile, “It was his first time drinking after all.”

“Really?” Nitori laughed, “Who’d have thought?”

“I know,” I rolled my eyes, “he’s _so_ good at hiding it.”

“Astoundingly good.” I heard Makoto say from behind us. He looked absolutely fucking done with the entire world. “Hungover Haru is now officially the worst kind of Haru.”

I almost scoffed, _Pffft as if there’s actually a context in which Haru could be the worst kind of anything._

 “He’s a light weight?” Gou peeped, still tucked into my side.

“Undoubtedly so.” Mako groaned slinging himself down on the other side of her.

“I’m gonna go check on him.” I said, Gou let me go and took a sip of her tea, as I headed out of the room and into Haru’s.

“Haru?” I said peering inside.

“Rin?” his voice was groggy.

“Yeah, it’s me.” It almost hurt to look at him, but I put on a brave face.

“Thank god, I’ve been looking for you everywhere…” he sat up in bed, “I’ve been meaning to apologize.”

My heart drummed in my chest, “For what?”

“I…did I try and like…kiss you?” I knew his memories were foggy.

I nodded, “You did.”

His eyes got wide, “I did kiss you?”

“No you did _try_ to kiss me.”

“Oh…I’m sorry about that…I don’t know…I mean…sorry.”

I snorted, “It’s fine man.” I walked over and sat on the edge of his bed.

He grimaced, “It isn’t fine at all though…”

“Why wouldn’t it be fine? You didn’t actually—“

“It wasn’t supposed to be that way.”

“What?” I was pretty sure I was dying.

“You weren’t supposed to find out…I mean…like that…”

“Find out what?”

“That I’m I mean…you know.”

Was he fucking coming out to me right now? What the fuck? Was this actually happening? “Gay?”

He was quiet for a long time, “Pan…but yeah…sure.”

And there it was. “I…” I didn’t know exactly what to say, “Haru, it doesn’t matter to me what you like, I mean you’re still you…”

“But I tried to kiss you…”

I shrugged, “You were drunk.”

“But I…” he stopped speaking like he was being insanely careful about what he said next.

“You what?”

He shook his head, “Never mind…”

I rolled my eyes, brushing it off, “You’re an idiot.” I said quietly, “Move over.” He did as he was told scooting over so that I could fit on the bed.

“Thanks for understanding.”

 _If only you knew._ “Thanks for telling me.”

“Did I have a choice?”

I snorted, “You really need to learn how to play the drunk card.”

“Guess I’m an amateur?”

“You’ll learn eventually,” I said though some part of me doubted it, Haru was a smart person fact wise, but when it came to social interactions he had trouble, cute anti-social little shit.

We were silent for a long time before he finally asked, “We’re okay right? I mean you’re not worried about it or anything, right?”

“We’re fine, I think you may have been out shinned by my sister on this particular occasion.”

“Makoto told me what happened…” he looked up at me absent mindedly running his finger across my bottom hip, “You got hurt?”

The corners of my mouth twitched up in a proud smile, “You should see the other guy.”

“ _You_ should put some peroxide on that.”

“No way, I wanna flaunt my battle scars, none of that health bullshit for me.”

“You still need to put some peroxide on it.”

“What the hell is that gonna do?”

“Make sure it doesn’t get infected dumb ass.” He jabbed me playfully in the ribs.

I jabbed him back, “It won’t get infected.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure, you have shit luck.”

 _Praise every deity, hallelujah, bless us all._ “Well you have a shit face so.”

“We can’t all be Abercrombie models.”

I snorted, _You could,_ nearly found its way out of my mouth, but I managed to suppress it, I threw my arms behind my head and shot him a sideways glace, “You’re right, it’s hard work being this breathtakingly sexy.”

“It doesn’t look that hard,” he sat up and examined me quickly, “Let’s try this…” Haru took his time situating his body in the exact same position as mine and shot me the same sideways glace I was giving him.

“Beautiful.” I said, audibly there was sarcasm there, but mentally there was nothing but admiration because it was true. He was beautiful.

“I know.” He said with a slight smirk.

“Do you?”

“Yep, I learned from the best.”

 _Did he just? No. Stop. Probably not_ , I told myself, I let out a huff of air, “So I guess this means you’re feeling better?”

“Nope actually, I feel like I’m about to vomit.”

“I swear to god if you fucking—“

“I’ll be fine if I lay down,” he sunk back down onto the bed and groaned, “Wow, this is terrible.”

“It’s called a hangover.”

“I was fine a minute ago.”

I snorted, “Meds wore off, I’ll go get you some—“ I’d started to get off the bed, but he tugged me back down.

“I just want to sleep.”

“Then sleep,” I looked at him curiously, “I’ll go find you some aspirin.”

He pulled me back to him, his arms around my waist, holding me close for a second before he released me, pressing his face into my shoulder, “Just stay here…” his voice seemed suddenly drowsy, “Please…I just…I wanna sleep.” He yawned against my chest.

I tried to calm my heart at the rate it was beating I thought maybe it’d prevent him from sleeping, but he didn’t seemed to notice as sleep graced his features and I was left with my favorite sight in the world, a sight I didn’t know was my favorite until that exact moment when I decided I’d give anything to wake up to it every day. Haruka Nanase asleep against my chest, our heart beats melting together, his features relaxed, his hair messy, I smiled, it was the most beautiful, relaxing sight I’d ever seen before.

All those weeks ago when he’d told me he show me a sight I’d never seen before…back when I thought it’d been the feeling of us swimming together, the sight of him in the water beside me…that didn’t even compare to the sight he was showing me now.

God I loved him. I loved him, I loved him, I loved him. And in that moment I didn’t care if that would change everything, I didn’t care that I’d have no safety net to catch me when I fell, I didn’t care that my mother would disapprove or what anyone else would think because the only thing that mattered right then was the small fact, “I love him.” I whispered, almost completely inaudibly. I just wanted to hear myself say it. I just needed to make sure I knew. _I love him._

………

I woke up the next morning to something tickling my neck. Through my groggy cloud of sleep it took me a minute to realize what it was, but when the realization came my whole body went numb. Haru. I willed myself to looked down, Haru was curled into my side, his lips hovering millimeters away from my neck, his light breaths fanning my hair out,  his eyes were closed, his face was soft in sleep and I was reminded of the sight I’d seen last night and the sight I was waking up to this morning… _beautiful._ My eyes trailed over his body, he wore the same grey sweat pants and thin white shirt he’d been wearing yesterday, though during the night the shirt seemed to have ridden up, _praise every deity_ , leaving a good portion of his toned chest visible. A noise settled in my throat, god dammit if I hadn’t already had an erection I sure as hell did now…and it didn’t help that a certain adorable black haired boy had his knee innocently pressed up against it beneath the cover of the blanket, he moved slightly forcing the noise past my lips, it was a sort of muffled moan that sounded a bit like a growl, I heard a chuckle from beside me, but I quickly noticed it hadn’t come from Haru.

“Good morning to you too Rin.” Mako said a sly smile crossing his lips.

“Shit.” I whispered under my breath, how was I supposed to slip a ‘no homo’ into this awkward situation?

“Did you sleep well?”

“…Uh…yeah…” I mumbled.

“Do anything interesting?” If he was hoping I’d catch the drift, I fuckin caught it, with my face, and it nearly knocked the fucking air out of me.

I stammered over possible responses in my mind for a full minute, and then simply muttered, “No.”

“You’re lucky…” Mako said stretching his arms behind his head, “I’ve never seen Haru crush on anyone before.”

“What?” I asked quickly, “He doesn’t…we’re just friends…I mean I’m straight.” The lie left a bitter taste in my mouth.

Mako ignored me, “He doesn’t like a lot of people…and he’s not very good at expressing himself. He’s easily impressed and distracted and it can make it difficult to tell when he genuinely likes people because though he’s generally a pretty easy person to impress, when he likes people he never shows it…he just sort of acts indifferent, and that’s annoying, I know, but if you’ll notice he only acts indifferent when he actually cares…and I think he really cares about you Rin.”

I didn’t know what to say. It didn’t feel like it, but then that was exactly what Mako had just said, so instead of replying directly to the subject I just stated bluntly, “That’s…I mean nice, but I’m straight.”

Again he ignored me, “You’d have to make a move or he never will…he’s shy…”

“I’m not making any moves, I’m—“

“You keep saying that Rin, just who are you trying to convince? Me or you?”

I blinked, “W-what?”

“Are you trying to tell me you’re straight or tell yourself you’re straight, because if it’s the latter do me a favor and just stop pretending you’re someone you’re not. If you act like you’re straight no one’s gonna end up happy. Not you, not Haru. No one. So please, if you’re gay or bi or pan, or whatever, just tell him about it. Don’t hurt him like that.”

“I…it’s…it’s not that simple.”

He laughed softly, “I know. I just…he deserves to know.”

I shook my head deciding to go back to my roots which were about as natural as a drag queens make up, “There’s nothing to know Mako…I’m straight.”

“Hpmh.” Was all Mako said pushing himself out of the bed, “Okay. I believe you.” With that he left the room, and I got the feeling he didn’t believe me at all.

I shook my head and wiggled my way out of bed without disturbing Haru. I showered and changed, and came back to wake him up as usual, I didn’t tell him I’d stayed with him the entire night, I didn’t tell him he’d been curved into my side less than two hours ago. I just woke him up like I did every day. Mako said nothing, Nitori said nothing, Nagisa said nothing, I said nothing, in fact all the facts that had somehow been drugged up about me and my sexuality didn’t seem to exist among us. Everyone kept quiet, as we went about our daily routine, swim practice, lunch, more swim practice until dinner, then more swim practice, then home for showers and bed.

I thought I was the only one left awake that night when Nitori walked into the living room, “Hey.” He said somewhat awkwardly.

“Hey…” I replied as casually as possible as he sat next to me on the small couch.

“Whatcha watchin?” he nodded to the TV screen.

“2012 Olympic team, just a bunch of replays and free style races.”

“Is that Micheal Phelps?”

“Yep,” I smiled, “I’m gonna beat him, I swear I am.”

“His record you mean…he won’t be swimming.”

“Well duh.” I said with a laugh I looked up at Nitori who smiled sheepishly, “Uh…Nitori I wanted to…apologize for what happened Saturday.”

“Don’t bother…it was nothing.”

“It wasn’t nothing. I shouldn’t have…I mean…I was drunk and I wasn’t thinking right, but…I’m not…”

“No I get it Rin. It’s okay. I’m not mad.”

“I feel like a fucking asshole.”

“It isn’t your fault you like someone else…Haru’s a lucky gu—“

“Why does everyone think I like him?”

Nitori laughed nervously, “Because you do?”

“I don’t!” I said sternly, I wanted him to believe it but how could he when I didn’t even believe it?

“Yeah you do…and that’s okay. As long as you’re happy.”

“I mean…I’m not exactly…happy…I mean…I’m just—“

“What are you so scared of?”

My eyes widened, “Hm?”

“Do you feel like you can’t trust us? Is that it? Like we’re gonna judge you if you come out, because look around you Rin, eighty percent of the people in this apartment are some sexuality other than straight…it’s not like we’re gonna abandon you if you tell us…”

“I…” I swallowed hard, “I can’t be gay Nitori.”

“What?”

“I can’t. My whole life all I ever heard is that it’s bad to be gay, a sin, or whatever…my mom never stops saying it Nitori…I…When I figured out that I liked Haru I was eleven years old and frankly it scares the shit out of me because I feel like if I’m not with him I can’t be happy, but if I were to be with him she wouldn’t let me be happy. I don’t have a lot of family…Gou and my mom, they’re all I have left…I can’t lose them. And if I…If I say it out loud then I lose them. One of them at least.”

“So what? You’re just going to pretend to be straight? Marry some poor girl have 2.5 kids and a white picket fence and fuck twinks in the bathroom at cocktail parties? That’s not a life Rin. You won’t be happy.”

“Yeah well…happiness isn’t exactly something I’m used to anyway…”

Something changed in Nitori’s eyes, “That’s a shitty way to live life Rin!” he shouted, I shushed him quickly waiting for someone to wake up, but no one did, “You can’t just accept an unhappy life! That’s not fair! You don’t deserve that!”

“I don’t have a choice!” It came out as half a yell half a whisper.

“Yes you do! You don’t know how she’ll react!”

“I think I do Nitori!”

“You’re gonna let yourself be miserable so that one person can be happy? One? How is that fair?”

“I never said it was, but she’s my _mom_ Nitori.”

“If she can’t love you for you she can’t love you at all.”

“She…I-it’s complicated.”

“Like hell it is. If it’s so hard to love your child for something they can’t help maybe you shouldn’t be a mother.”

Tears stung my eyes, I was angry, but no at him, I was angry because he was right, “I just want her to accept me.” I stammered, “But she’s not going to…so I’ll just have to let her think she does.”

“Then you’re both living a lie Rin.”

“At least one of us is happy.”

“What about Haru?” he asked.

 _“What about Haru?_ ” I repeated.

“You’re just gonna ignore how you feel about him?”

“I’ve been doing it for six years.”

“Yeah, but he wasn’t right in front of you then.”

I looked at my hands, “I know.” And I did know, of course I fucking knew, it was so hard to stay away from something at arm’s reach. It was so hard that it hurt, but I could deal with the pain. I could take the little things and make them seem bigger, and I would be fine. I could deal, “I can do it.”

He looked worried, “Matsuoka-senpa—“

“I can do it. I’ll be fine.”

“Are you—“

“Yes.” I handed him the remote, “I’m tired, I think I’m gonna go to sleep.”

“Rin…I’m sorry…”

I shook my head as I stood up, “You didn’t do anything. I’m in this position because of me. And I’ll deal with it.”

“Rin—“

“Don’t worry about it Ai.”

“I—“

“I’ll see you in the morning, alright? I really need to sleep…”

He said something else, but I didn’t hear. I was too busy thinking about what he’d said: _So what? You’re just going to pretend to be straight? Marry some poor girl have 2.5 kids and a white picket fence and fuck twinks in the bathroom at cocktail parties? That’s not a life Rin. You won’t be happy._

God that sounded horrible. That wasn’t the kind of life I wanted. I wanted to be happy. I wanted to be myself…but…I also wanted my mom. I wanted to stay in her life. I wanted to keep being her son.

I had a decision to make.

I called Gou.


	6. Kiss Me Hard Before You Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a Supernatural reference, a date, and lot's of pretentious universe talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sunday has arrived! It is 1:49 am and I'm updating now because I'm going to Valhallacon with Ana tomorrow and I won't have anytime to upload the chapter, so you guys get it verrrrrrrrrrry early! I hope you like it! Chigusa Hanamura makes her first appearance and though it may seem doubtful by the end it won't be her last which will probably piss you off after you read the chapter, but yeah this thing with them isn't over yet. And the other thing that happens right at the end isn't really beginning yet, because 1. Rin does stupid things in the moment out of feelings because in case you haven't noticed that's just how Rin is and 2. Even though he does stupid things in the moment he still has problems accepting things he does/is.
> 
> Addressing a few tumblr asks: Rin isn't in denial over his sexuality anymore, he knows he's gay, however he isn't ready for other people to know and the fact that he's lost most control over hiding it is taking a bit of a toll on him, because he feels he needs to keep it secrets and people around him disagree, so right now he's denying them the simple pleasure of knowing for sure, he's trying to rebuild walls that fell down long ago and it's not really working, but he's trying and will continue to try as hard as possible which you'll see in this and upcoming chapters, he does do something that's gonna make that really really hard for him, but I'm just saying don't be surprised by any denials of sexuality claims, his mother is on the line here, he's gonna do what he needs to do, but feelings sometimes have other ideas. (That's a whole essay lemme stop)
> 
> Anyway, please tell me what you think with a comment! They encourage me so so so much! And if you have any questions you want me to see or want a little spoiler you can send me an ask adressing Alienation on tumblr at: oswwinoswald or aloisearltrancy. 
> 
> If you want a spoiler or preview or something I'm sooo willing to give them if you drop me a friendly ask with a nice little spoiler request attached. 
> 
> Thank you so so much for reading! <3 This chapter is pretttttty long so brace yourself.
> 
> PS: The title is from Summertime Sadness by Lana Del Rey and there is a quote right at the end and I guess you could use the "roll credits" reference if you like cinema sins where it says "Dancing through the universe alone" That is from Alienation by Morning Parade which inspired this fic.

“A date?” Haru asked tilting his head to the side in confusion as I attempted to tie my tie.

“Yep, Gou set it up,” I shrugged acting like I wasn’t freaking out, “I decided what the hell, right? I mean I could use a girlfriend.” Ew no no I could not use a girlfriend ew no. Ew.

He just shrugged, “Do you know anything about her yet?”

“Yeah, I met her once a few weeks ago, she was with Gou, her names is Hanamura? She’s on the track team.”

“Chigusa Hanamura?”

“Yeah I think.”

“Oh…she’s…nice. Pretty too, don’t mess it up.”

I glanced over my shoulder and grinned at him, “Me? Come on now Haru have a little faith.”

He sighed, “Is Mako going too?”

“Hm?”

“He was putting on nice clothes earlier…”

“Oh! Yeah, he and Gou are coming.”

“Double date? You don’t seem like the type.”

“And what type do I seem like?”

“Not the type who wears a jacket and tie on a first date with someone he barely knows, actually not someone who takes people on dates to at all, or wears ties unless he has to, you must really want to impress this girl?”

“Maybe I just want to look nice?” I said continuing to fumble with my tie, “And I totally take people on dates, how do you expect me to date people? Just point to them and shout, ‘Yo we’re dating. Cool? Cool.’?” He snickered and pushed himself up off my bed and rolled his eyes, grabbing the untied, slightly crumpled tie, that hung around my neck and tying it with ease, his eyes meeting mine as he fixed the knot snugly around my neck.

“Something like that.” He said, “As for looking nice, you’re aiming for the stars, Rin. Let’s be real here.” _Well I do have a habit of setting unachievable goals._

“What?” I said raising an eyebrow, “Not your type?”

He just laughed, neither of us noticed how his hands lingered on my shoulders, “It’d be awkward if you were.”

I snickered, “Haru, I’d be honored to be your type, after all that means I’m hot right?” I winked.

“Pffft, I’m way out of your league.” He joked letting his arms fall back to his sides. _Nah bitch I had no fucking clue thanks for reminding me._

“You have it backwards.”

He looked at me seeming to ignore the comment, “I was right.”

“What?”

“You’re not the type of person to wear ties. You can’t even tie one.”

“I can, I just—“

“Oh that’s why I just tied your tie for you.”

“I didn’t ask you to.”

“You’d been trying to for a solid ten minutes.”

“Shut up.”

“Make me.”

My heart clinched I was about to respond when I heard Mako through the door, “Hey! Rin! The girls are here, it’s time to go!”

I glanced at Haru, “Coming!” I shouted, “Wish me luck?”

“Good luck jerk.”

“Thanks bitch.”

I left the room promptly, finding the three of them waiting for me by the door, Gou was dressed to the nines in a sixties style teal cocktail dress that was lace at the top and flowed into elegant tulle at the bottom, she smiled when she saw me, “Don’t you look handsome?” she said with a broad smile nudging the shorter girl beside her who I remembered only vaugly, she was pretty, thing, but muscular like most athletes, she wore a loose ballerina pink dress with one shoulder embellished with tear shaped beads, her brown hair was tied into an artsy bun, and she smiled sweetly when she saw me.

“Hello,” she was a bit calmer than my sister, _thank god,_ “I’m Hanamura! We’ve met before but…”

I smiled, “Rin.” I said, maybe this wouldn’t be too bad? She seemed nice enough, she was pretty, she was an Olympian, the only thing wrong with her…she wasn’t Haru.

“Should we get going?” Mako asked with a kind smile.

“Yeah.” The rest of our party said in unison as he lead the way, we ended up taking Hanamura’s car and Gou explained as we pulled up to the restaurant why the attire was necessary.

“Basically this is the nicest restaurant around the center, it’s where all the coaches and investors dine and it’s top notch. We have to look and act out best, you never know who’ll be here, now we’re here to have a good time, but Olympic judges like to come here so be on your best behavior.”

I laughed, “Okay mom.”

Hanamura snickered beside me.

And Mako who was opening Gou’s door to let her out suppressed a laugh, smiling at Gou, “Let’s just have a nice time alright?”

She gulped, and took his hand as she got out, “Totally. Yeah, I mean, let’s have fun.”

I let myself out, accidentally forgetting to open the door for Hanamura, but she didn’t seem to mind she had no trouble opening her own door.

We went inside, Gou gave the hostess our names and we were seated almost immediately. The place had an earthy vide to it, all browns and greens, calming colors really, the menu contained everything from sushi to spaghetti, which Mako ordered without a second thought giving me the feeling some Lady and the Tramp shit was about to go down, ugh I’d have to watch that shit.

Gou ordered Shrimp and Hanamura settled on Caesar salad, well I was still deciding, my eyes found their way to the fish bit of the menu, where the word _mackerel_ reminded me of Haru and Haru reminded me how much I’d rather be well anywhere else, but then I reminded myself I was the one who called Gou and begged her to set this up and therefore I was gonna deal with it. For the sake of my closeted homosexuality this was mandatory, I decided on the chicken parmesan after a few more minutes, and the table drifted into a comfortable conversation, until things started getting couple-y and I wanted to run and hide.

“This is such a romantic setting,” Gou mused resting her head on Mako’s shoulder.

He seemed pleased with the ordeal, I raised an eyebrow and he smiled.

“Yes!” Hanamura said, “It’s so pretty in here, perfect for dates, don’t you think Rin?”

I blinked and forced the tiniest of smiles, “Yeah, great for dates.” I forced myself to scoot closer to her I could almost _hear_ my mind hiss in protest.

She blushed, as a placed my arm around her shoulder, she looked at Gou, “How do you deal with all these cute boys twenty-four-seven, you’re with Rin a lot, I bet his roommates are just as cute as he is.”

Mako glanced at me, and I looked away, “I mean look at Mako?” Gou said nudging him playfully.

Mako blushed.

“And Nagisa and Rei are the cutest!” Gou beamed, “They’re boyfriends and just adorable. And then there’s Rin’s kouhai Nitori-san. He’s so sweet, dontcha think Rin? He’s got the cutest little crush on you.”

I tried not to think about kissing him, “He’s a cute kid.”

“Isn’t he your roommate?” Hanamura asked a concerned look on her face.

“Yeah, he is.” I said eyeing her suspiciously.

“Well aren’t you worried he’ll I mean try something? He has a crush on you after all.”

“He’d never do anything without consent.” Mako said sharply, like sharper than I imagined someone as soft spoken as Mako could ever manage.

“Yeah, but I mean sharing a room with him…isn’t it weird?”

I shook my head, “Not at all. He’s my friend. He likes me? Yeah so what…he’s harmless really.”

“But doesn’t he watch you change? Isn’t it weird to have a gay guy watch you change?”

I couldn’t really find the words to argue, I knew where this was going, and I knew it was better to keep quiet, but Mako didn’t seem to agree, his expression was twisted into some sort of disappointment, “Do you have a problem with it? Gays I mean.”

“Uh, no, I mean I don’t really care what people do in their free time, but it just seems like it’d be awkward.” I let out a small sigh or relief, she was wrong, but at least she wasn’t a homophobe.

“It’s not.” I assured her, “He knows I’m straight,” _he most certainly does not_ , “so he knows there’s no point in trying anything, he’s probably the nicest person I’ve ever met so it’s not like I’d shun him just because he’s gay. That’d be stupid.”

“Oh.” She said quietly, as the table fell into an uncomfortable silence.

It was a full five minutes before Gou spoke, “Hey! Look!” she pointed at the approaching waitress, “The food!”

“Oh good I’m starving.” Hanamura said a bit awkwardly, I felt the tiniest bit bad for her, she was misinformed, it wasn’t a crime, but it wasn’t something that made me particularly excited to have her as my beard. _Ew did I just used that word to describe her? Really? Wow I’m an asshole._

Thing settled down eventually, we were all comfortable again, the food was delicious, and the rest of dinner went on without at hitch.

As we walked back towards the car Gou’s eyes lit up, “We should go for a walk!”

All three responses were different,

The “That’s sounds awesome!” came from Hanamura.

The “Where do you want to walk?” came from Mako.

And the, “What?” came from me, because I’m eloquent like that.

“A walk! There’s a park right down the street we could leave the car here, it’d be fun!”

I shrugged, “Why not?”

Gou smiled, “Yay!” she grabbed onto Mako’s arm, “Let’s go!” The two galloped ahead of Hanamura and I, Mako’s hand slipping into Gou’s, I could see the smile on his face from behind him. Absolutely adorable. And I imagined Gou’s too.

“Hey!” I called cupping my hands around my mouth, “Touch my sister and I’ll fucking kill you!” My voice wasn’t threatening. I trusted Mako, I liked him, and I approved of him for my sister.

He looked over his shoulder at me, “I’d never dream of it!” he shouted back, the sarcasm was detectable, but I have him a thumbs up.

“You’re really protective over her aren’t you?” Hanamura asked.

“Yeah I mean I’m sure you know what happened two weeks ago, and she’s my little sister I just wanna keep her safe, make sure she’s alright.”

She smiled, “That’s sweet. So do you like Mako then?”

“He’s a great guy and he’ll take good care of her and if not I know where he lives so it’s a win win.”

She giggledsnorted, which was actually kind of cute, though I could tell she was embarrassed by it, I smiled though and once she finally stopped blushing she said, “I’m sorry by the way.”

Wow an apology she was nicer than I thought, “Don’t worry about it it’s just, Mako and I have three gay roommates,” I decided to exclude the recently de-closeted pansexual Haru because I didn’t know if he’d be okay with that, “and they’re some of our closest friends. You gotta understand though it’s not awkward. It’s not weird. If they wanna look let them look if not then whatever, I won’t lose any sleep over it and I’ll still be their friends in the morning.”

“I see.” She smiled, “I’m sorry, I’ve never really had any gay friends so I just thought…” she let the sentence trail off, “Anyway, I had a really nice time tonight thank you.”

“It was Gou’s idea.”

“That’s true, but thanks for being a nice date. Maybe we could do it again sometime?”

_Oh great here it comes._  “Yeah sure.” I did my best not to sound turned off by the idea, she was nice after all, she was a nice girl and it wouldn’t be that bad. _It would be better if she had a dick._ My mind laughed at me, fuck you mind.

Her smile brightened and she slipped her hand into mine, somehow I managed not to pull away, don’t get me wrong though it’s not that I find girls gross or anything, I usually don’t mind them, like I don’t wanna fuck them, but girls in general I had no problem with it’s just holding her hand listening to her talk about our next date was making me feel sick. Like I was doing something wrong. And I was I mean technically I was only on this date to cover for my repressed homosexuality, but it wasn’t my morals it was more like this feeling eating at my heart I couldn’t quite place, well I suppose I could sort of place it, I’d felt it before when I was kissing Nitori, it was the I-wish-it-was-Haru feeling. I hated that feeling. Ugh why couldn’t it be Haru? Why did it have to be this poor girl? And more importantly why was I living out Nitori’s prediction. Why indulge it? I knew it wasn’t what I wanted, but at the same time it was necessary to get what I wanted. I mean I had to try right? See if I could be with a girl? See if I could change, even if the thought made me sick to my stomach.

I was so busy focusing on not puking I didn’t even hear Hanamura talking until she nudged my shoulder, “Are you listening?” she asked.

“Uh, sorry, we have assessments for final placement next week so I’m stressing.” _Technically only half a lie._

“Oh god, so do we! I’m freaking out, Coach says he thinks I’ll either be doing 100 or 400 meter hurdling and I’m so scared, and also excited, but mainly terrified, I mean it’s so soon, four months now? Wow can you believe we’ve been here two months?”

It felt like days, “Seems like we just got here. I’m supposed be doing 100 meter free and the relay. He’s basically told us what we’re doing, but he wants to make sure we’re capable, hence the assessments.” I thought about the relay which I’d be swimming with Mako, Nagisa, and Haru. A sort of calm washed over me. I’d be with Haru and it’d be great.

“A relay? Wow, you don’t...” she seemed almost nervous about saying the next bit.

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but you don’t exactly seem like a team player.”

“I can be when I like the game.”

“You like replays?”

“When the right people are involved.” _Haru, Haru, Haru, Haru._

“Who’s involved?”

I fought the urge to shout Haru, “Nagisa, Mako, Haru.”

“Haruka Nanase?”

“Uh…” I glanced at her, “Yeah.”

“Oh! He’s supposed to be one of the stars of the team right?”

Pride swelled in my heart, but I managed to keep myself from bursting, “Yeah, Haru is great, he’s one of the best swimmers I’ve ever seen, graceful, amazing form, and he genuinely loves water. Seriously that guy takes showers for three hours because he gets to be with water, it’s like he’s in love with it.” _Rin. Stop. Your gay is showing._

“He only swims free though right?”

“Yep, doesn’t swim anything else.”

“You swim free too yeah?”

“Uh huh. We have the exact same time actually in the 100 meter actually, but he’ll be doing 200 in Rio.”

“So is he like your rival then? Gotta beat his time and all that jazz?” _Wow jazz? Seriously? Okay._

I smirked, “Not at all, Haru and I have been friends since we were eleven actually, he’s my best friend.”

“Aww! How nice! You two trained together all these years?”

“Well no…I moved to Australia for a while, but we’re back now.”

“G’day mate!” she said in a terrible Australian accent that actually properly cracked me up.

She smiled at me, “Want me to put some shrimp on tha barbie?” she winked.

I snorted, “That’s ridiculous.”

She laughed tilting her head to the side, “Thank you.”

“Adorable.” I commented, causing a deep blush to bounce over her cheeks, “Even cuter.” I said. She was cute I wasn’t lying, any straight guy would be going crazy over her, but I, sadly, was not a straight guy, and while I found her antics adorable there was still no attraction on my part.

She opened her mouth, but my cell phones ringtone cut her off, “Hello?” I said without looking at the caller ID, it was Gou, “At the car?” I listened, “Okay yeah, see you in ten.” I ended the call, “They wanna meet at the car now.”

She sighed, “Oh alright.”

The walk back was calm, I personally would have called it boring, but I knew I was supposed to describe it as a comfortable silence, but I didn’t really want to call it that because even though it was comfortable and there was silence I reserved that term for my time with Haru. Because there was a lot of comfortable silence during that time. Haru was a pretty silent person after all.

The girls dropped us by our dorm, Gou stepped out to hug Mako goodbye, and I noticed her steal a quick kiss on the cheek.

I managed a hug, but that was all I really wanted to give, that and a smile, as soon as the lobby door closed behind us I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding, “Did you have fun?” Makoto asked.

“Uh, yeah, we did.”

“Do you wanna see her again?” I didn’t know why, but there seemed to be some sort of challenge in his eyes like he knew what the real answer was.

“I think so.” I said with a shrug.

“Do you like her?”

“She’s sweet.”

“Yes or no?”

“Why?”

“I’m curious.”

“Does this have something to do with your fantasy that Haru likes me?”

“Probably. And it isn’t a fantasy.”

“Yeah it is, I’d know okay?”

He scoffed, “You’re just as stupid as Haru when it comes to this.”

I ignored him as I unlocked the door to our dorm, “Honies we’re home!” I called.

Haru, Nagisa, and Rei were sitting on the couch watching some action movie and looking very bored, well Haru looked bored, Nagisa and Rei looked busy making out, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Haru jump up so quickly, but before I knew it he was dragging me out the door, a bag in his hand.

“What are we doing?” I asked as he dragged me into the elevator.

“Swimming.”

“What? Now?”

“Yes.”

“I’m in a suit, Haru.”

“Yes,” he threw me the bag, “I know.”

“You had a plan huh?”

“I was tired of watching Nagisa suck Rei’s face.”

“Where’d Nitori go?”

“Bed I think? Something about smart people making stupid choiced? I don’t know, but I want to swim.”

“Why didn’t you go on your own?”

“Because I wanted to swim with you, is that a crime?”

“Not at all, just why’d you even wait if t bothered you?”

“Because I had to get you.”

“I’d have met you there,” I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone, “there’s this magical thing called texting.”

“You were on a date.”

“So?”

“So, I didn’t want to disturb you.”

“Oh god, shut up, you wouldn’t have disturbed me.”

“Not a good date?”

“No it was, I’m just saying I don’t mind it when you text me idiot.”

“Noted.” He said, as we arrived at one of the many pools on campus, this one, which was closet to our dorm, was an outdoor pool.

“Haru this isn’t a 24/7 pool.”

He shrugged, “So what?”

“So we can’t get in.”

“Yeah we can,” he said climbing over the fence without much hassle. Oh the things Haru will do for water, “See?” he said as he dropped to the ground on the other side.

I did the same, my movements a bit limited by my stupid suit, I stumbled a little on the decline.

“Graceful.”

“Suit.”

“Fair point, go change.”

I laughed, and headed to the simple changing stalls on the opposite side of the pool area.

I returned to find him in the pool his body stirring the water as he glided through the water effortlessly, I hadn’t even noticed when he said, “You’re staring.”

“Hm?” I asked, before my eyes got wide and I tried and failed to hide a blush, “Fuck, I’m…no I wasn’t.”

He smiled, “Get in.”

I jumped in the water causing a splash big enough to bring a satisfied grin to my lips. Haru swam a few circles around me casually, “So are you gonna tell me?”

“Tell you what?” I asked bobbing up and down in the water.

“About the date.”

“I already told you it was good.”

My eyes fell into place with his as he circled closer, “Aren’t friends supposed to talk about this sort of thing? Dates and stuff?”

“I don’t know…” I said looking down, “not exactly used to having friends.”

“Me either.” he muttered.

“Then what’s Mako?”

“Mako’s not like you. He doesn’t make me talk. He lets me be quite, but you, you make me talk. So I’m making you.”

A tiny smile played at my lips and I tried to ignore it, “We had fun.”

“Do you have anything in common?”

I thought about it, and realized I wasn’t really sure. I’d spent most of the night thinking about Haru anyway, not exactly listening to her life story, guess I was a pretty shitty date when it came down to it, but she didn’t seem to mind. “I’m not sure, I was sort of distracted.” I realized all too soon I had absolutely no story to explain why I was distracted luckily Haru helped me out.

“Distracted by her looks?”

“Something like that.” I found myself floating on my back looking up at the stars, Haru swam over to me, and copied my position, I smiled, it was hard…ya know…trying to look at the stars when you had something so much better floating next to you. Something so much more beautiful than any star could ever hope to be. I forced myself to breath, to focus on the stars, I calmed my heartbeat and closed my eyes. He was distracting. I was supposed to be freaking out over the pretty girl I’d just gone on a date with not the pretty boy floating beside me in a pool we’d broken into. I was supposed to be falling in love with her right now, not mulling over being in love with him. I opened my eyes slowly glancing at him from the corner of my eye, he was staring at the sky an expression of deep thought gracing his calm features, “What are you thinking about?” I asked quietly.

“How you might have had a better time if you’d gone on a real date.”

I was confused, “I think a dinner date is pretty close to a real date don’t you?”

“Maybe for some people, but not for you.”

“Is this about your ‘Rin doesn’t take people out to dinner’ theory?”

“Not a theory. I’d never seen you more uncomfortable looking than when you left in that tie, until you came home in that tie. You looked like you were in pain, you’d think if you hate formalities so much you’d just do something else.”

“Like what?” I asked, it was barely audible. It wasn’t the tie I was uncomfortable with.

“Like this.” He moved his hands to gesture to our surroundings, “You’re calm now, you look like you can breathe again.”

Did I? That was ironic considering I’d been holding my breath ever since the fucking conversation started. “Water calms me.” It was true. Water did calm me. Being in it or just around it was therapeutic, but not quite as therapeutic as Haru, even if being around him usually caused nine or ten consecutive heart attacks.

“Maybe next time you should bring her here?”

“Maybe I should.”

We were quiet for a long time until he finally broke the silence, “Rin I was wondering, if I had kissed you that night would you still be here right now?”

Where had that come from? “I…”

“I’ve been thinking about it a lot. And I-I just want to know…How much do you think things would have changed.”

I knew. I knew the answer. “Everything would have changed.” I swam to the edge of the pool, and closed my eyes, _1…2…3…Don’t do anything stupid._ I told myself.

“Everything?”

“I don’t think anything would have ever been the same again.”

“I…I-I’m glad I didn’t kiss you. I…I’m happy with how things are…I wouldn’t want t-to…lose you…over something like that…” I could feel the pain in his voice, and I could hear how he was trying to ignore it, he swam up next to me pushing himself up on the ledge of the pool so that he could get out, but I yanked him back down.

“That’s not what I…I mean…I didn’t mean it like…y-you’re not gonna lose me.”

We hovered close together for a moment, he opened his mouth to say something, and I did something stupid. I cut him off, not with words, but with my lips. I pressed closer to him, drawing him in with my arms, he didn’t fight me, didn’t push me away, my tongue found its way past his lips fighting his for dominance which he finally conceded to, he melted into me, I melted into him, and  a second, a useless fucking second that meant absolutely nothing to the whole of the universe, became the most important second of my life.

I knew it would end and our moment would be over and time would keep going, and thing _would_ change, but in that moment we were dancing through the universe alone, holding onto a second that would inevitably end. And damn was I intent on never letting go.

 


	7. Coming Clean

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY OKAY! So it is Actually VERY VERY early Tuesday morning, not Sunday, but I have good reasons, I just got back from a week of vaction on Sunday and I was sooo tired so I wrote all day today, but next chapter will be either Sunday or before Sunday I PROMISE! This chapter is plot sooooooooooooooooorry, but it's necessary. However I'm thinking smut next chapter maybe??????????????? We shall see depends on how things go!
> 
> Be sure to comment! And leave happy things to inspire me! Any ideas about the confession scene that WILL be happening next chapter would be loved! I'm thinking it will involved being pinned against a chain link fence, but I haven't decided? 
> 
> follow me on tumblr: oswwinoswald or aloisearltrancy (for anime) Any questions or comments can be left there or here
> 
> and adressing a comment I got one or two chapters ago: in the anime they call Makoto 'Mako-chan' and since I' pretty much abandoning honorifics for this fic, I'm calling him Mako, it's also a name I see often in the fandom like on tumblr and such, but I'm gonna keep using it. Also Hanamura is sometimes called Hana-chan so she'll sometimes be called Hana see how this goes? Hope it doesn't bother you all that much I wanted it to seem more casual, ya know?
> 
> Anyway thanks so much for the lovely comments ily all!

I ran. The instant my lips left his I ran. I ran because I didn’t know what to say or what I should say or what I wanted to say. I ran because I’d just been on a nice date with an equally nice girl. I ran because no matter what I did I still didn’t want people to know. I still wasn’t ready. And I didn’t know if I ever would be.

I knew he followed me, I don’t know for how long, but I knew he did. Eventually he must have given up though because I’d been slumped up against the same building for an hour with no sign of Haru.

I was a stupid fucking wreck. A stupid gay fucking wreck.

I didn’t know what to do or where to go, surely Haru went back to the dorm, which meant that was out of the question because obviously the only way to fix something was to avoid the thing until the thing either went away or forgot…neither of which seemed likely so I was stuck without any good ideas, I didn’t have my phone, but there was change in the pockets of my trousers from earlier, and conveniently a pay phone in my direct line of sight so I chose to call someone I’d barely talked to since I came to this school. My mom.

I dialed her number, listening to the rings. One. Two. Three— “Hello?” Her voice was full of sleep.

“Uh…hi, Mom.”

“Rin?” she sounded more awake now, “Rin baby are you alright? Where are you calling from?”

The way she went from cranky next door neighbor to momma bear in point five seconds reminded me of why I loved her, “A pay phone on campus…”

“Rin, why are you not asleep? Do you know what time it is? Where on campus?”

“Uh…no…I don’t know what time it is and,” I looked around, “by the volley ball gym I think.”

“Two in the morning, did something happen are you alright?”

I sniffled, she was so worried, but would she still care if she knew why I was crying right now? “No…” I sniffed again, “I had a fight with my roommate…and uh, I really miss home.”

“Sweetie, you know you can come home whenever you want, but baby what was the fight about?”

He couldn’t tell her that because there was no fight. He was just a fucking screw up who didn’t even know if his dream was worth the stress anymore, “It…it’s complicated.”

“Do you have your keys? Are you intoxicated? I’ll come and get you—“

“Mom it’s a two hour drive.”

“It doesn’t matter, if you’re hurt I can—“

“No…I just…I wanted to talk to you.”

“Then talk to me sweetie.” Her voice was so soft, and he wanted nothing more than to hug her right now. God dammit…why couldn’t he be a six year old again? Why couldn’t life be uncomplicated? Why did he have to be this way?

“I…messed up…”

“Can you fix it?”

“I’m not sure.”

“What did you do?”

“Something I can’t take back…”

“What did he say?” she wasn’t pressing for details which was an absolute blessing.

“I didn’t really give him time to say anything…”

“Then he might not be as upset as you th—“

“No. He will be. Or…I mean either way…I did something stupid and I can’t fix it.”

“I’m sure it’ll work out, which roommate is it? Surely Haru’s on your side right?” He was quiet long enough she seemed to catch on, “Oh sweetie. Haru won’t stay mad at you long. Not if you apologize.”

“This isn’t something I can’t just say sorry for…”

“Goodness, sweetie, what did you do?”

“I…” he wasn’t sure what to tell her.

“Did you steal his girlfriend or something, because Rin I raised you better…”

I sniffled, “Uh…” Just go with it, “yeah…”

“Rin Toraichi Matsouka! You know better! Playing with someone’s emotions is the worst pain you can cause someone, you know that! Messing with feelings…honey…that hurts.”

Rin wasn’t exactly sure he’d messed with Haru’s emotions partially because he wasn’t sure Haru had any emotions period, let alone towards him, but he was sure kissing someone and then running away in some way probably most definitely counted as messing with emotions on some level. So Rin just whispered, “I know. And you don’t understand mom, I’m so sorry. I wish I’d never done it.” He didn’t know whether or not that was true either because damn it had felt amazing.

“Maybe you should tell him that?”

“I want to, but…I-I don’t know how…I’m not good with feelings…” Never had there ever been a more true statement, “But I know I want him to forgive me…or you know…understand why…because I care too much about him to lose him.”

“You care a lot about him don’t you? You’ve never been the type to feel especially bad about things like this…”

“He’s my best friend…I need him to…I need him to understand…”

“You keep saying you need him to understand, but what exactly do you mean?”

_I mean I want him to understand how I feel, and the situation, and why I kissed him, and why I can’t be gay and why I’m scared, and I why just want him to kiss me again, and everything. Everything. I want him to understand everything._ “I mean why I did it…”

“And why is that?”

“Because…I mean…because things needed to change.”

He’d asked me if they would have and I said yes, but not because I didn’t want them to. I did. I needed to get out of this fucking rut, but now that I was ‘out’ I sort of wanted to get back in. Like when you get out of a pool and the air is fucking freezing and all you want to do is let the water wrap itself around you again and make you feel warm…safe. That’s what I wanted…I wanted to feel safe, but just like when you get out of the water, I knew that I would feel warm soon, but it wouldn’t be the water that warmed me it’d be something else…it always was.

Hopefully this time that something was Haru.

My mom was asking me something I didn’t hear when the pay phones meter ran out. Probably what I meant, I wouldn’t have known how to answer that, because even though I’d known something needed to change it was a change I wasn’t ready for.

I slumped back against the building, resting my head in my hands. It must have been hours later that I heard my name being called, “Rin? What are you doing out here?” I looked up meeting Hanamura’s green eyes, her hair was in a high ponytail, and she wore track shorts and a tank top.

“Uh…I…what time is it?”

“Four-forty-five? Are you alright?

“I just…I don’t have my phone on me and I haven’t been paying attention.”

“Rin answer the second question. Are you alright? Are you hurt?”

“No I’m not hurt, but I’m not alright either.” I was about to be painfully fucking honest to a girl I’d been on a date with less than eight hours ago.

“What’s wrong?” she was kneeling now, her hands grasping mine gently.

“Have you ever done something you didn’t exactly want to do, but then you realize it was something you needed to do?”

“…Not exactly, but I think I understand what you mean…What happened?”

This poor girl was too fucking nice to have to deal with an asshole like me that was for damn sure. “I kissed him.”

She seemed confused, “What?”

“I kissed him and now everything’s fucking ruined.”

“Kissed who?” her face had fallen, but she didn’t look any less concerned than she had been moments ago.

“Haru.”

“You kissed Haru? Why would you kiss Haru?”

“Because I’ve been in love with him for six years.” Plain and simple.

She swallowed, “Six years?”

“We were eleven when I figured it out…I’ve hidden it for six years and…and I just…I couldn’t do it anymore. I kissed him…and it just…I feel like my whole life is breaking apart and I can’t fucking stop it and I don’t know what to do.”

She squeezed my hands, this is the part where she asks about her, about why I’d gone on a date with her if I loved Haru, I waited for her to ask, but she just…didn’t… “Hey,” she wiped a tear off my cheek that I didn’t know was there, “Rin, don’t worry. It’s gonna be alright. What did he do? What happened after you kissed him?”

I sniffled, “I ran.”

“What did he do?”

“He chased me for a little while, but he stopped I guess.”

“Well you’re a good hour away from your dorm, he probably lost you…”

“Probably…I went the darkest way I could find so it’s likely.”

“You didn’t want to talk to him?”

“What was I supposed to say? Hey um, I just got back from a date with a pretty girl, and this is crazy, but I fucking love you, so date me maybe?”

She suppressed a laugh, “Maybe tell him how you feel about him? I mean you kissed him, but you didn’t actually tell him how you felt…did he kiss you back or was he shocked?”

“He kissed me back I guess…”

“Ya think maybe he’d like to know? I mean you kissed him and he kissed you back, maybe he feels the same way?”

“It doesn’t matter if he does.”

“How on earth could it not matter?”

“Gou doesn’t know yet…and neither does my mom…I know Gou would be okay with it, I know that, believe me I do, but my mom would never accept it. She’d never let me come home…and I…I’m scared because I don’t want to lose her. I’m not ready to lose her—“

“Did you ever think maybe she’d take it better than you think?”

“She hates gays Hanamura.”

“Now maybe, but if it were her son…her own son, do you really think she’d hate you?”

“…I…”

“Gou talks about your mother often. She raised both of you pretty much on her own after your father died right? She worked two jobs, but even with that, on Sundays she’d always take you both to the market, then when you got home she’d teach you how to cook. A new meal every Sunday, that’s what Gou said. A women with two jobs, trying to feed two kids and herself…and still making time to spend time with each of you? She seems like she loves you a lot Rin. She doesn’t seem like to sort of person who’d give up her kid over something like sexuality…I don’t know her…I don’t know what she’d do, but I’m just saying even if it takes her a while to come to terms with it…I bet she’d learn to love you for it.”

I’d forgotten how close Hana was to Gou. Best friends. That’s what Gou had said. Of course Gou talked about our mom. Of course she did, Gou loved our mom…so did I. I mean she was my mom and no matter what I loved her, but I liked to avoid problems. Pretend they don’t exist. Which obviously doesn’t work as well as I’d like it to, but either way, my mom was the sort of problem I liked to ignore, so I didn’t talk about her much, Gou on the other hand talked more than the average person. Hana probably knew our entire family history.

Since I didn’t answer I suppose Hanamura decided to keep talking, “You shouldn’t hide who you are…I mean I know I’m not that experienced in this area or anything, but I definitely believe that. You deserve to be happy, and if you think being with Haru would make you happy then you should be with him or at least tell him how you feel. You say it wouldn’t matter if he liked you back but that isn’t true…we both know if he said he liked you it’d make everything just that much more worth it.”

It was true. If I knew for a fact I’d have something happy to fall back on then I’d be more willing to come out. But isn’t everyone more willing to tell the truth when they have a safety net?

“Just make sure you know what you want before you do anything. Like you know he’s what you want.”

“He’s what I want. I’ve known that longer than I care to admit.”

“Then tell him that, but first you need to sleep. You look awful…well I mean as awful as a gorgeous male swimmer can look.”

I laughed, “Can’t. He’s at home.”

“Oh well, come on then,” she gets to her feet extending  friendly hand, “You can sleep in my bed. I’m done with it for the day anyway.”

“Won’t your roommate be a little surprised?”

“She’ll get over it.” Hanamura laughed, “You’re gay anyway, no worries.”

That was the first time someone else had actually said that. Surprisingly it felt good.

I took her up on her offer, her roommates were a bit surprised, but got over it and I fell asleep as soon as I hit the mattress.

***

It was like twelve pm when I finally woke up, to Hanamura shaking me, “Gou is freaking the hell out get up!”

I groaned, “What the fuck?” my voice was sleep filled.

“Gou has called me nine-teen times she’s worried sick about you, come on you have to get up.”

I sat up lazily “Lemme call her.” I opened my hand for the phone.

“What are you gonna tell her?”

“The truth?”

She placed the phone in my hand, “Okay…”

I dialed my sisters number, she picked up on the first ring, “Hana! Have you seen—“

“Hi Gou.”

“Rin! What the hell are you doing with Hana’s phone? Where are you?”

“She let me borrow it, I’m fine.”

“Haru said you ran off! Why’d you run off Rin?”

“What exactly did Haru say?”

“You were swimming and you just ran off.”

I laughed, that cute god damn lying son of a bitch. He was a terrible liar,  but hey at least he’d attempted, “Can we meet?”

“Yes. Right now please. Where?”

“How about you meet me in the lobby of the faculty dorm?” I was in the girls dorm faculty was a five minute walk, “Like six minutes.”

“Okay. I’ll be there.” She hung up.

“Six minutes?” Hanamura raised an eyebrow.

“I need to get this over with.”

“Okay…” she walked with me to the door, “Good luck.”

“Thanks for everything…and I’m sorry…”

“Don’t be…and don’t worry everything will work out.”

“I hope so…” I said quietly, five minutes later I found myself at the faculty dorm, with Gou wrapped up in my arms.

“What happened?”

“It’s a long story.” I said my voice as steady as it could be.

“Haru is so fucking worried about you right now, he waited up all night for you to come home. He’s freaking out Rin. What even happened?” My heart ached. He’d waited up for me?

I smiled at her, “Nothing happened. I’m fine, Haru and I had a fight and I got worked up, but I’m fine now.”

“You can’t just disappear for five hours on us, you can’t worry your friends like that. Jesus Rin we didn’t know what happened to you!”

“I know…”

“Seriously…I just…what even set you off?”

“I’ll tell you later…I should probably talk to Haru though…”

She breathed out, “I’ve never seen someone so fucking worried before Rin. He’s been looking for you since sunrise.”

“Where is he now?”

“They all had to go to swim practice. Makoto made him go…he didn’t want to…” Haru _didn’t_ want to swim? What the fuck had I done?

I nodded, “I’ve got to go talk to him Gou.”

“Good idea.” She released me, “Go. Call me when later though after you talk it over…”

“I will. And uh…I love you…and I’m sorry…for worrying you I mean.”

She rolled her eyes, “I always worry about you Rin. Always..”


	8. Counting Stars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SUNDAYYYYYYYYYY!! Haha sorry it's late on Sunday, but Sunday never the less! I hope you like this chapter, it's a bit short, but I really love it actually. I think it's sweet.
> 
> Titled Counting Stars because of Counting Stars by One Republic.
> 
> Thanks so much for all the attention you've been giving this story it's an absolute joy, thank you all so so so much I love you all <3 Make sure you tell me what you think about this chapter too :)
> 
> I started a new Ereri fanfiction called You and the Sun it's a 1950's Greaser AU soooooo check that out if you ship Eren and Levi from Attack on Titan? 
> 
> Thanks soooooooooooo much again, ily and enjoy! 
> 
> tumblr: oswwinoswald or aloisearltrancy
> 
> ((Again this fic is completely unbeta'd so forgive any mistakes but feel free to point them out so I can change them UNLESS you're reading on fanfiction.net because I'm sorry but it makes to much effort but you can read it on ao3 if you want me to correct things.))

_God please help me through this because I know I’m gonna fuck this up, bless it be, a-fucking-men._ I said a final prayer as I positioned myself against the chain-link fence behind the pool practice was being held at that day to wait for Haru. He always exited from the back. Always. He hated the attention that came with leaving from the front, so I was counting on catching him alone.

I glanced at my watch. Practice had ended twenty minutes ago, which meant Haru should be coming through that door any second now, in fact he was probably just getting out of the shower as I counted the seconds.

Jesus fuck, this was actually happening.

I was engulfed in a rage of thoughts, I imagined all the ways I could screw up, all the things I could say wrong, all the responses he could give, I was in the middle of imagining Haru brutally beating the shit out of me when I heard his voice, “Rin?”

I looked up, my eyes meeting his, “H-Haru…”

He stepped towards me and suddenly I had no clue what to do, “What happened last night.”

I shook my head, “I did something stupid.”

Haru cringed like he was waiting for some sort of insult.

“I ran.”

He seemed surprised by my confession, “What?”

“I shouldn’t have done that…it was a dick thing to do. God it was stupid, but I was scared…I mean literally fucking terrified…and I didn’t know what else to do.”

Haru crossed his arms, “Why were you scared?”

I shrugged, “There are too many reasons to list if I’m being honest…”

“You kissed me.”

I looked at my feet, “…I know…”

“Why did you do that?” he swallowed coming closer till we were standing not even arm’s length apart. “Why did you do that, Rin?” he sounded desperate now, “What the hell were you trying to do? What exactly did you aim to achieve by that?” he took a deep breath, “Did you know?”

My eyes snapped up to meet his, “Know what?”

“Did you know that I liked you? Is that why you did that? Did you think it’d be funny?”

“Haru...” he didn’t really think I’d do something like that…did he?

“Because it isn’t. I know I don’t talk much, and I’m a pretty boring person to be around, but it’s still not funny. I’m not okay with being the bud of a joke…” he sniffled, “I’m not…I mean…I’m a person, and I don’t get it—you’re straight and” he was clearly freaking out, the look in his eyes pained me,”…why would you—“ I grabbed him by the shoulders, but he kept talking.

“Haru!” I shouted pushing him up against the chain link fence, trying to get his attention, it worked he fell silent, “Haru, I’d never do that to you! I kissed you because I wanted to! Not because I thought it’d be _funny!_ I’d never fucking do that! You’re not boring! Not to me. You never have been, and I’d never ever make you the bud of a joke, tell me you understand that?” My voice was sharp as I tried desperately to get my point across.

He looked up slowly, “You w-wanted t-to?” I felt his body relax under my touch. I took a deep breath, calming my nerves, my hands released his wrists, grazing over the muscles of his arms and neck till they reached his face, I dragged a reassuring thumb across his cheek. He was so beautiful. God I didn’t fucking deserve him in my life let alone was as anything else.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, this was it. “I’ve wanted to since I was eleven.” He opened his mouth to respond, but I cut him off, “I-I need to say this…” I took another breath, “I’m in love with you Haru. I have been since before I can remember…and I-I’m sorry…I didn’t tell you…there are reasons…lots and lots of reasons I don’t really want to think about right now, but you should know…I kissed you last night because I couldn’t stand it anymore. I couldn’t take it. You-you’re so fucking beautiful Haru, and last night you looked so sad…and I didn’t want you to be sad, I know, I completely fucked that intention over, but I swear Haru, I swear I just…I had to. I’ve loved you too much, for too long, and I just need you to know.”

I looked at him breathlessly, it was over, I’d said it, my part was done, I dropped his gaze and looked down at our cheats my breathing had picked up, but I could see his was calm, I tried to make mine match his, I needed to be calm. I needed to be calm, I needed to be cal—

“Rin, look at me.” My train of thought ended right there, when I finally looked up at him I was greeted by Haru’s lips, my arms wound around his waist instinctively, my heart beat so quickly I was sure it was going to burst out of my chest, but somehow through my eradicating heart beat I managed to match his movements, I felt his cool fingers twist into my hair, as his tongue trailed against my bottom lip praying for entry which I allowed, this time no one fought for dominance, everything was simple, balanced, easy. I put every single emotion into this kiss, and I could feel him doing the same, and when we broke apart neither of us could breathe, so we didn’t, we stood together, him pressed into me, me pressed into him, his head under my chin as I placed soft kisses over his scalp. I don’t think either of us knew what to say, I knew I still had a lot of things to explain, I knew there was a hell of a lot to work out, but at that exact moment I didn’t really care, finding a cure for cancer was lower on my list of important things, because to me nothing was more important than the way Haru’s arms felt around my waist.

“I’m an idiot.” The realization was far too true. Everything I’d done so far to keep my secret had been stupid, everything I’d thought had been stupid, it was all wrong. All of it. I couldn’t even attempt to be happy if I wasn’t being myself. I couldn’t even act like it, but now I didn’t have to.

“Yeah.” Haru looked up at me his blue eyes sparkling, he planted a chaste kiss on my lips, “I know.”

I laughed, “I’m not the only one though, come on Haru, you thought it was a joke? Seriously?”

“Yeah well you can be an asshole sometimes.”

“When have I ever been an asshole to you?”

He paused, and then laughed into my collarbone, “Shut up.” I smiled into his hair.

“Told you.”

He yawned.

“Are you tired?”

“I stayed up all night waiting for a certain red head to come home.”

I cringed, “Sorry about that.”

“Where’d you even go?”

I hesitated a little bit before admitting, “Hanamura’s.”

I felt him tense, “How’d you end up there?”

“She found me sulking around on the other side of campus at four am. I sort of dumped all my shit on her…she took it better than anyone else I’d told…”

“You probably crushed her dreams.”

“Hm?”

“I mean look at you, you’re gorgeous, she was probably already planning your wedding…”

I snorted, “Well she’s gorgeous too so I doubt she’ll have any trouble finding someone else.”

“Whoever they are they won’t top you. Literally or figuratively.”

“I don’t know they might top me _literally_.”

Haru nudged me in the ribs, “Jesus Christ Rin. This is not what you say to the person you just confessed your undying love to.”

I laughed, “I wouldn’t say _undying_.”

That earned me a sharp jab to the ribs instead of a nudge, Jesus Haru could hit hard when he wanted to, I actually had to step back and catch my breath, “Again not something you say to your boyfriend.”

My heart imploded and I’m pretty sure my eyes got a million times wider, “Boyfriend?”

Haru’s blush was probably the cutest thing I had ever seen, “Maybe…I mean…if you want…”

I could literally feel how huge my grin was, ear to ear probably, it felt like if I smiled anymore I’d rip my skin, but I was sure that wouldn’t stop my smile from growing, I was actually pretty positive nothing could, I grabbed his hands and pulled him into a kiss, “I think I might like that idea.”

“Good.” He kissed me again.

………

The next three days were sort of a blur of happiness and catching up on swim practice. Haru and I kept going to the pool at night like we usually did, except this time whenever I felt like kissing him I didn’t have to force the thoughts away, this time I could just kiss him.

My boyfriend Haru. My boyfriend. Haruka Nanase my boyfriend. My boyfriend. I was pretty sure if I had a diary at this point there would be at least three whole pages filled front and back with sentences like that since it was pretty much the only thought I’d had for the past seventy-two hours.

We told our roommates first Nitori, Nagisa, and Makoto, congratulated us with big hugs and happy smiles and Rei who looked entirely confused about the whole thing looked at us and said with a  completely straight face, “I thought you two were already a thing.”

So I guess you could say that it went well.

We’d told Gou second, and by we’d I meant I’d, I’d told Gou second and that conversation had gone something like:

“Gou, uh I need to tell you something.”

“Okay, shoot.”

“No I mean it’s pretty serious.”

“Is someone dying?”

“Uh…no?”

“Then it’s not as serious as you’re making it out to be.”

“But it is—“

“Just tell me.”

“Gou I’m gay.”

“And?”

“And what? That’s it. I’m gay.”

“Rin I’d have to be an idiot to think you were straight. I mean let’s take a look shall we, you’re an Olympic swimmer, you have ace abs, pectorials, multifiius, and iliocostals, I’ve seen girls fawn over you, pretty girls, like girls from the ladies swim team, volley ball players, a certain track star, but you never ever fawn back. Like you notice, we know you notice because of your insanely huge ego, but never reciprocate. It screams gay on many levels. Also I also always sort of thought you’d steal Makoto from me to be honest so…yeah…”

”Not Makoto.”

Her eyes had widened, “But someone?” she raised an eye brow, “Who?” she squeeled, “Finally someone I can talk about cute boys with! Is it Haru? Please tell me it’s Haru, Haru and you would be so cute!”

I blushed, “Uh…”

“It is! Oh my god I’m amazing! Okay so have you told him?!”

“Uh…”

“You have! What did he say?”

I thought of how he’d barely said anything, “Uh…”

“Oh my god! Are you together now then?”

“Yes?” I finally had an actual answer.

“Oooo kill em’!” she said doing a little enthusiastic dance.

I cringed, “This is the last time I tell you something major.”

She composed herself and offered me a kind smile, “Thank you for telling me something I already know, big brother.”

And then I’d left because one: I’d accomplished my goal, two: I had a boyfriend to go see, and three: she was scaring me.

Now Haru and I were laying somewhere in the grassy hills of the massive golf course, it was midnight, I wasn’t looking at the stars, but I could see them reflected in Haru’s eyes and they were beautiful, though not nearly as beautiful as Haru. Nothing ever was. How the fuck did he do that? Some part of me said there was some Snow White bullshit going down here, but another part of me told me I was a dumb ass so I ignored the first part.

Haru’s thumb was drawing lazy circles on the back of my wrist as our hands lay melted together over the green neatly kept grass. I don’t know whether or not he noticed me staring, but he didn’t seem to. In fact he looked like he was deep in thought, I laughed to myself, it was a good look for him.

He turned his head to look at me, apparently my laugh had escaped my realm of thoughts, “What’s funny?”

“Nothing really, it’s just,” I shot him a sideways smirk, “Lately I’ve been losing sleep, dreaming about the things that we could be, but baby I’ve been praying hard, said no more counting dollars, we’ll be counting stars.”

Haru broke out into a fit of laughter, “You’re ridiculous.”

“I know, but at least it’s a good song.”

“Top forty of 2014.”

“Indeed it was,” I pulled my iphone out of my pocket scrolling through the songs till I found it, “You know the only time we ever danced you were drunk off your ass.” I said climbing to my feet.

He looked at me like I was asking him to help me hide a body, “Dance? Rin…no.”

“Oh come on Haru.”

“No.”

I hit play, and smiled, one of the reasons I’d loved the song was because of how quickly it started, there was no super lengthy intro, just lyrics, just like that. “Please.”

“Nope.”

I grabbed his hands, and pulled him up, for someone who didn’t want to dance he sure as hell didn’t put up much of a fight, I pushing his arms up around my neck, leaving my hands to linger around his waist. We swayed to the music, I whispered the lyrics into his ear.

_But baby, I been, I been prayin' hard, said no more counting dollars, We'll be counting stars…Yeah, we'll be counting stars._

I spun him as the music picked up and he laughed, he’d been doing that a lot lately and I loved it.

Haru was even more beautiful when he laughed, I pulled him close again, “I’m a terrible dancer.” He whispered quietly.

“So am I…but it’s midnight, and we’re two gay swimmers standing in the middle of an Olympic golf course so I figure, if I’m gonna embarrass myself I might as well do it here with you dancing to One Republic, rather than at a wild party to Fergie.”

He blushed, “Oh god I danced to Fergie?”

I laughed, pushing the image of him kissing the girl out of my head for the millionth time, “It was fergilious.”

He leaned his head against my shoulder trying to hide his deepening blush, “I made a lot of bad choices that night.”

“Everyone made bad choices that night.”

“That was the night I almost kissed you.”

“Almost being the operative word.” I said my mouth quirking up into a confident smile.

“I wish I had.”

I thought back to that night and shook my head, “It would have made things a lot more difficult.”

“That’s probably true.” He said, “But I still wish I had.”

“Could have been interesting.”

“How?”

“Well aside from being out first kiss, you were really wasted, who knows where things could have gone?”

“Are you saying you would have taken advantage of me?”

I laughed and kissed him on the forehead, “I’m not saying I wouldn’t have.”

“You’re such a charmer Rin.” He whispered.

 “That’s what they all say.”

He rolled his eyes, and I kissed him, properly kissed him, pulling him against me, letting the music drown out to be replaced by the white sound that always came with kissing Haru. Jesus if this was what love felt like I never wanted out of it that was for sure. I bit at his lip, and he parted his lips, My tongue lapped over his, he pushed himself into me, claiming dominance which I found he enjoyed doing, he arched his back using my shoulders to hoist himself up and lock his legs around my waist, his lips leaving mine for a few seconds, I immediately missed them, and made a soft moan of thanks when his lips found mine again, I smiled into the kiss. How I felt right now was the definition of happy.

He was like a drug, I took in as much of him as I could at a time, I never tired of him, and when I was kissing him I never wanted to stop.

I felt him smile against my mouth, I think that was the best part. The part where I wasn’t the only one happy about it. The part where he was smiling just as much as I was. That’s what made it the best. That’s what made me the happiest.

I smiled, pressing one last kiss to his lips, as the last few cords of the song drifted out.

“I love you.” He said quietly.

It was the first time he’d said it. Of course he already knew how I felt about him it was sort of the reason we were together after all, but he’d never said it back, not that I’d expected him to. I mean I knew he loved me on some level. He was my best friend and I was his so the love was already there it was just unspoken.

A smile engulfed my features, “I love you too,” I scoffed, “Even if you are a shitty dancer.”

“Take it or leave it.”

“Take it. Always.”

His smile was soft, his eyes drifted upwards to the sky, I watched the stars fill his eyes again, watched them dance through the sapphires that belonged to the man I loved, there he was, beautiful and stoic, and eyes full of stars. My Haru.

I placed a kiss on his jaw line, and found myself looking up at the stars too.

Just five months until Rio. Five months until we started counting stars.

 


	9. Publicity is thy Enemy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Don't let Nagisa use Instagram. Ever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SUNDAYYYYYY!! I'm on time like fo real today! Okay so today on Alienation we get to see how publicity screws up lives, or maybe helps them??? 
> 
> Thank you to all the people who follow this story and even bigger to those who leave comments because they keep a smile on my face twenty-four-seven!! I love you guys! 
> 
> Be sure to tell me what you think of this chapter! Even the tiniest comments help! And if you want a spoiler or have any questions you'd like me to answer directly message me on tumblr!
> 
> If you ship ereri from Attack on Titan check out my other fic You and the Sun
> 
> TUMBLR: oswwinoswald or aloisearltrancy
> 
> TRACK TAG: 'fic: alienation' 
> 
> Thanks so much! Ily! Byyyye!
> 
> OHH AND PS: All the Instagram accounts (the commenters at least) are real accounts! You should follow them! cumberbabes is run by a friend of mine, kirklandcosplay is my cosplay partner and my best friend, hannah._.jean is my photographer and my closest friend, and aloistrampy is me! My cosplay account at least!

I bit my lip nervously, my hand was wrapped tightly around Haru’s as some sort of attempt at feeling calm, but I was failing miserably. We were lined up along one side of the pool with the twenty two other (twenty four in total) member of Japan’s Olympic swim team.  Our coach, Sasabe-sensei, was standing uncharacteristically quiet and still. A group of official looking people we’d never seen before were gathered before us with clip boards.

It was time to start press coverage.

Not something I was particularly excited about.

See how it goes is our coach gives the press a list of the fastest swimmers on the team, from those they narrow it down to most interesting, be it in looks or personality, basically they pick someone the public will love…all the members would get their own interviews of course, but the ones they were picking today were the ones who would become popular. The ones who would cover just as many magazines as J-pop stars. I did not want to be one of those people, but it’s not like I would have much of a say in the matter.

The group of press circled us like hawks, I didn’t dare let go of Haru’s hand. Sure I was a pretty vocal person usually, I wasn’t scared of attention, but having all of Japan looking at me…yeah…um …totally no fucking pressure or anything.

I bit my lip as one of the women, a petite girl with thick rimmed glasses, waltzed up to me…us? I don’t know, but she came to stop in front of us.

“Rin Matsouka and Haruka Nanase right? You two have the fastest time on the whole swim team,” she glanced at our intertwined fingers, “that’s very impressive. I’m Mirai and I work for The Paper Sun maybe you’ve heard of it?” Of course I’d heard of it was one of the most famous talk shows in Japan, “We’d love to have you two in for an interview if you’re interested.”

Shit shit shit, this is exactly what I did not want to happen, but we were on orders not to refuse the publicity, Haru managed a tiny smile though his tightening grip on my hand told me he wasn’t enjoying it much either, “We’d love to.”

I nodded.

“Great!” Mirai said excitedly scribbling something down on her clipboard and then tugging down one of the sleeves on her oversized pink sweater, “Can you do Wednesday at nine am?”

Haru just nodded this time.

Tomorrow. I nearly groaned.

“Alrighty! Thank you so much!” she skipped on down to the next person on her list.

Apparently they wanted all out interviews together, I think we only got one separate for an American magazine called SwimmingWorld that was doing an interview with every swimmer on all the Olympic teams, all of those interviews would take place later today according to the man since they were doing one country every three days.

My turn for that particular thing came to quickly and forced me to release Haru’s hand…ew.

“So, Rin,” the American’s voice was thick and a tiny bit southern, “you and Haruka are the fastest on your team? They must work you to death.” Was that a question?

I shook my head, “We’re the fastest, but the training regimen is pretty mellow. It’s strict and demanding yeah, but this is the Olympics, to be honest I expected worse, but it’s pretty much the perfect regimen for me and Haru too.” Answering was easier than I thought.

“The lives of the Japanese swimmers have been pretty closed off to the public, not many of you have social media, is that a rule or?”

“No, uh, it’s not a rule, we can pretty much do whatever we want in regards to the internet, but we’re busy I mean our training takes so much time and the rest of it we spend being lazy, playing videogames, sleeping, just hanging out, yeah we’re Olympians, but we’re just kids, I mean I’m only seventeen and I’m sitting here talking to SwimmersWorld like I’m some sort of professional, but it doesn’t feel that way. I guess the free time we have we usually use it to achieve some type of normality and going on the internet and blogging or updating twitter is just not as much of a priority.”

“Interesting, so, tell me about your family? How do they feel about your swimming.”

Oh here’s the part where I get to talk about Dad…fun. “Well my dad inspired my swimming. He swam professionally for a while during his youth, but then he had me and my sister and our mom to take care of so his Olympic dream sort of faded, he died when I was still pretty young, but I always wanted to make to the Olympics for him, of course my mom is really supportive of the idea,” I cringed a little, she still didn’t know about Haru and I and it bothered me more than I cared to admt, “she made sure I had all the things I needed to do my best, I went to an elite school in Australia for a while, before finally coming back to Japan for the Olympics, supporting my country I guess,” I smiled proudly, “I have a sister who’s been really great, she’s actually an assistant to the swim teams for this Olympics which I’m pretty proud of her for, she’s the best little sister a guy could have. She’s uh, she’s over there actually.” I pointed across to where she was standing with Ama-senei and Sasabe-sensei, I watched the camera pan with my hand. The interviewer smiled.

“She looks just like you, are you close?”

“Yeah we’re pretty close, I mean she’s my little sister so it’s like the rule with most siblings the only one allowed to hurt her is me everyone else is dead if they lay a hand on her,” So dead, “She’s dating one of my close friends, Makoto Tachibana, you might have already interviewed him, I don’t know, but yeah she gets along really well with all the members of the swim team because of me and him and they all love her like family, I’d say I do too, but well…I mean I sort of have to.” I laughed.

“Speaking of dating, are you seeing anyone?”

I laughed nervously, “I might be, but that’s for me to know and you to find out.”

“Oh come on, give the ladies some hope.”

I thought of Haru, “Sorry ladies, I’m afraid I can’t help you.”

“So whoever it is, is it serious? Will we see them at the games?”

I nodded at the irony of the question, “You will most definitely see them at the games.”

“And in the games you are…” the rest of the questions were sort of generic swimming questions, which events, what’s my time, what’s the best time I’ve ever made, what will I do after, yada yada yada. Ten minutes later the interview was over, I found Haru and we met up with Nitori, Rei, and Nagisa, Mako was still being interviewed, we decided to go get coffee.

“Sennnnnnpaiiiii,” Nitori whined tucking his head into my shoulder as we sunk into a booth at the cafe, “I hate interviews…”

I laughed, “Me too Ai, me too.” My hand was linked with Haru’s beneath the table.

Rei sat across from us waiting for Nagisa to return with our drinks, “So Haruka-senpai, did they ask you about your beautiful strokes?”

I set my jaw into a glare, “Are you hitting on my boyfriend in front of me, Rei?” I challenged the tiniest hint of a smile playing at my lips that told everyone I was joking.

Haru shook his head, “They didn’t, but they did ask me about my time and if I hated Rin.”

“Hated Rin?” Both Rei and I said at the same time.

“You better not hate Rin, because Rin can totally cut you off.” I continued.

Haru looked at me and rolled his eyes, “I don’t hate you, but they asked because apparently there should be rivalry between us since we’re neck and neck for fastest time, I told them I wasn’t the competitive sort and you were my best friend so no I didn’t hate you.”

I planted a kiss on his cheek, “Good.”

I heard Nagisa laugh as he approached the table with our drinks, “Going at it like bunnies I see.”

My face flushed bright red, “N-no…”

Nagisa just laughed and handed out the drinks, Haru’d only ordered a fruit smoothie since he didn’t usually drink coffee, I’d gotten a caramel latte because they were hella rad, “Haru,” I aid after taking a sip, “You have to try this it’s so good.”

“Hm?”

I tilted the straw towards him and he took a small sip, making a srunchy face afterwards, “So how is it?”

“Bitter.” He said still making the face.

“Bitter? You’re kidding right?”

“No…it’s bitter.”

“Haru you’re like a ten year old sometimes.”

“No I’m not.”

I laughed, “I’m dating a ten year old.”

“You won’t be for much longer if you keep calling him a ten year old,” Makoto’s voice came from behind.

“It’s okay because I love him.”

Haru rolled his eyes sipping his own drink as Mako scooted into the booth beside Nagisa and Rei, who were doing the same thing Haru and Rin had just been doing except with a chocolate croissant, and it looked more like Nagisa was shoving it down the taller boys throat, however it ended with Rei getting a big kiss on the cheek so everyone looked happy.

“I’m not excited about the interviews.” Makoto said reaching across the table and grabbing Haru’s drink without asking.

“Me either…” the rest of us all groaned in unison, expect for Nagisa who seemed really excited about the whole thing.

“I didn’t even realize I didn’t have an Instagram!” he exclaimed, “I made one after the interview, I’ve called it nagisauce,” he made a rainbow motion with hands, “Come on, be in my first post,” Nagisa said pulling out his phone and opening the came in selfie mode, “Smile!” he commanded after he positioned it so everyone was in the picture. I shot a peace sign, Haru sipped his reclaimed smoothie, Makoto smiled kindly, Nitori gave a wide grin, and Rei was blushing as Nagisa pressed a kiss to his cheek. It was a very cute picture I had to admit.

He captioned it, ‘Starbucks with the team, and the bae’ an assortment of heart emoji’s was attached to the end.

“The guys was right, no one even knows the Japanese team, so I’ve decided to put us out there, we’re getting involved!” Nagisa said with a contagious grin.

I shrugged, “Works for me, but if you post pictures of me sleeping I’ll kill you.”

“Deal.” Nagisa said with a humored laugh.

*****

The Instagram thing had gotten out of hand really quickly.

Seriously how many times could you actually post on Instagram in six hours? Apparently there wasn’t any sort of limit because he’d just started the account and t had twenty posts. Granted he’d gained two-thousand plus as soon as people had found out it was his official account. Apparently Nagisa already had some sort of fan following? I guess that’s what happens when you’re a cute blond with a big smile.

I groaned. Food. He’d even taken pictures of his food. Who wants to see your food Nagisa? I know, no one. We were all sat around the couch, Haru had made dinner, I smiled inwardly at how perfect he was, and of course Nagisa had posted a picture of it, but that had been nearly an hour ago, the plates still littered the table, but we were all too lazy to move them or move at all, I rested my head against Haru’s chest, “Tired?” he murmured into my ear.

I nodded and closed my eyes snugging harder against him I felt him press a kiss into my hair, I didn’t even notice the camera flash from Nagisa’s phone as I drifted off to sleep.

****

Morning came too soon as always, apparently the couch had been our bed for the night, everyone else must have gone to their own rooms, because Haru and I were alone, I was still curled against his chest his arms encircled my waist, I loved waking up to him. God I loved it, but that was probably just because I loved him period.

I reached down for my phone which had fallen between the couch cushions.

My eyes widened at my notifications. Fifteen missed calls. Thirteen text messages,

Wow, shit, what did I do?

I opened one of the texts, most of which were from Gou.

**Gou (6:45am): HAVE YOU SEEN INSTAGRAM?**

My first thought was why the fuck is Gou up at six am and my second was, what the hell?

**Gou (6:51am): SERIOUSLY RIN! tell me ur not in the dark about this cuz it’s serious**

**Gou (7:00am): RIN ANSWER YOUR PHONE**

**Gou (7:05am): i called u 6 times how r u not waking up**

**Gou (7:06am): look at this**

There was a picture attached to the message, a screenshot from Instagram actually, Nagisa’s Instagram to be more specific, of Haru and I from last night, he’s kissing my hair, I remembered it vaguely, but I was pretty much asleep, after the picture there was a number of likes…how the fuck is a picture even able to get that many fucking likes. So many fucking likes. Like over forty thousand. How the fuck? Below the number of likes Nagisa had captioned the picture ‘Rin and Haru’ with a million hearts, and even farther bellow that a few comments were visible (though the site was kind enough to say that there were six-hundred more to see) they were pretty kind for the most part the four I could see anyway:

**cumberbabes: omfg !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i ship itttttttt! ~Scarlet**

**kirklandcosplay: THE JAPANESE TEAM IS LIKE SPEAKING FOR LGBT AT THIS POINT! It’s awesome! I’m really excited about the games now! I can’t wait to see them swim!!! OR FUCK, I mean swim, yeah swim like hella.**

**hannah._.jean: idk who these two are but they’re cuties! @aloistrampy**

**aloistrampy: Jesus fuck, that’s fucking adorable! CAN WE JUST! Ugggghhhhh swimming homos are my new fandom.**

Swimming homos? Ship? Fandom? This was weird.

And probably bad.

I read the rest of the messages from Gou.

**Gou (7:10am): it’s on the news btw. like rin…**

I checked my other messages, two from Hanamura, three from my coach, one from Nitori, and one from my mom.

**Hana (7:06am): Call Gou she’s freaking out.**

**Hana (7:06am): Has your mom seen?**

My coach had been more positive thank god.

**Sensei-Sasabe (6:55am): Rin you’re supposed to tell me when you start dating a team mate.**

**Sensei-Sasabe (6:57am): However it’s great because of the publicity! Listen kid, people go crazy for a power couple! Congrats kid!!**

**Sensei-Sasabe (7:00am): You and Haru do need to come fill out one of the papers though, it’s a policy, like HR or some shit, just come by later today. I texted Haru too, but he doesn’t ever use his phone so…tell him.**

The text from Nitori said:

**Ai (7:00am): I went to get coffee, you guys were so cute , I didn’t wanna wake you up, but you owe me Starbucks later today, kay? :) Sleep tight!**

Then there was a text from my mom…I dreaded it. I didn’t want to read it.

I was gonna kill Nagisa.

I held my breath, and tapped the message. It was plain and simple.

**Mom (7:23am): Call me.**

It was eight-o-three now.

I slipped out of Haru’s hold and into the hallway, I was holding my breath. I hit the call button beside my moms name.

She answered immediately, but she didn’t say anything.

“…Mom…”

I could hear her swallow.

“…I…I’m sorry…”

An inhale, “So it’s a real picture then?”

I took a shaky breath, “Y-yeah it’s real.”

“You’re…gay?”

“Uh…” I thought of Haru sleeping on the couch, “I’m not sure.”

“You’re not sure? You just let guys kiss you?”

“I…no…it’s just one guy…”

“Haruka.”

“Yes…mom…I…”

“Rin. Don’t apologize. You’re not sorry. So don’t.”

I closed my eyes, “I love him.”

“What?”

“Mom I love him. It’s not a stupid crush. It’s not like that at all. I really really love him…and I know how you…uh…feel about this…I swear I do…but I tried for eleven years to be who you wanted me to be…it’s time to be who I am.”

“Eleven years?”

“I figured out I had a crush on him when I was eleven…it’s why I wanted to go to Australia…I didn’t want to be this way…I didn’t want to…to disappoint you, but I can’t help it. I tried Mom…I tried not to love him…I can’t.”

“You’ve been hiding this for eleven years?”

She still hadn’t screamed at him, “…I…yes.”

“You didn’t think you could trust me…you let me say all those things…terrible things…Rin…I said horrible things.”

What was happening? Was she serious?

“Rin…I love you. You’re my son…and I still don’t understand this…at all…but…I love you. And I still love you even though you love him…and I mean…I can try…I will try to understand.”

“…You…What?”

“I don’t understand, but I’m gonna try to.”

“Mom…” I couldn’t believe her reaction, I was sort of at a loss for words, “thank you…” I managed.

She was silent for a long time before she finally said, “C-can I meet him?”

“…It’s Haru mom, you already know him…”

“But…as your…uh…boyfriend…can I meet him?”

I smiled, she was trying, “Yeah. We’ll come see you whenever you want.”

“How about this weekend? I can meet that boy Gou’s seeing too.”

“Makoto,” I laughed, “You’re gonna love him.”

“I’m sure I’ll love Haru too.”

I wanted to cry, she was making a real attempt, “I hope so.”

“…So um, I’ll talk to you soon, alright?”

“Yeah…and mom…I love you.”

“I love you too.”

The line went dead.

I took a deep breath.

That’d gone better than I could have ever hoped for.

Maybe Nagisa wasn’t going to die today.


	10. And Everything Else is Just There

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> rin is like really happy about his mom. he's still pissed at nagisa. steamy things go down. oh and gotg refernces yaaaaaaas.

I told Haru about my mother with a kiss, well more than one kiss, multiple all over his face and his neck.

He was still asleep when I returned, but my kisses woke him up in record time, he groaned…or maybe moaned…both? I’d combine those words to make it cooler, but as it turns out combining words that are only one letter different doesn’t sound that cool so whatever, either way he made a sound against my lips that just made me want to kiss him more, which I did.

When I finally stopped he twisted one hand into my hair and cupped my face with his other hand, I was straddling him lip, our faces still mere inches apart, he smiled softly, “Why are you so happy this morning?”

I shook my head and rested my forehead against his, “I love you.”

His smile spread wider, damn he was perfect, I snapped a mental photo of him like that, “I love you too, but why’re you so happy?”

I reached up to play with his bangs which were getting just a little too long, “My mom knows.”

His eyes went wide, the smile I loved so much faded, “What?”

“And she said she didn’t understand…but she wants to and she’s going to try.” My voice was barely a whisper. I kissed him again, “She’s gonna try Haru…she cares enough to try.”

It took a minute, but his smile returned, “She’d be crazy to give you up.”

There was a marching band inside my chest. I was so lucky. Lucky to know Haru, let alone have him to myself, we shared another million kisses when I laughed against him lips.

“What now?”

“We have to take Instagram away from Nagisa.”

“Why—oh my god…that isn’t how…?” I nodded, “Jesus, please don’t kill him, he’s a little thoughtless, but he’s a good kid, Rin, don’t hurt him too bad.”

I shook my head, “I won’t hurt him, but he might wanna start watching himself when he’s in the pool with me.”

“Jesus don’t go all Jaws on him, Rin.”

“Paybacks a bitch.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“Oh yeah? Well at lea—“ I didn’t get to finish my sentence because the door to Nagisa and Rei’s room swung opened and Nagisa came bursting into the living room sobbing full force, Rei was chasing after him of course shouting something about not forcing the subject, but I didn’t hear it correctly because Nagisa had tackled me into the couch.

“I’m so sorry Rin! I didn’t know people would explode like that! Gou texted me…she was really really mad and I am really really sorry…” he sniffed, “I you can f-forgive me.”

“He’s been like this for an hour.” Rei told them looking slightly upset himself, probably because Nagisa was upset.

I looked from Rei to Haru to Nagisa and then patted his hair reassuringly, “There, there…” I was pretty shit at comforting people to be honest.

“Y-you’re not mad?”

“I was fucking pissed to be honest…but I talked to my mom and no, I’m not mad.”

“You what?” Rei and Nagisa said in perfect unison.

“Yeah…things are looking up. Probably thanks to you Nagisa.”

There was an interval of heavy silence in which all that was done was Nagisa looking up at Rin with pleading eyes and then snuggling himself into Rin’s shirt.

“I’m really sorry Rin-rin.”

Rin shrugged and wiggled out of Nagisa’s grip, “It’s okay.”

“But your still…?”

“Still at little pissy, but I’ll get over it.” It was true that Nagisa had helped more than he’d hurt, but I still sort of hated the fact Nagisa had thought posting it wouldn’t have consequences, it was evident he was sorry now that he knew, but I sort of wanted him to understand what could have happened, not that I was going to tell him, but it was enough that I didn’t really wanna be around him for the rest of the day.

Rei wrapped his arm around his boyfriend’s shoulders, “We’ll give you some time then.” He dragged Nagisa towards the door.

Nagisa was muttering apologies, that were now muffled as Rei hand pulled Nagisa into his side and was kissing him on the top of the head, reassuring him with promises that I would forgive him and it was true I would forgive him, after a day or so, so the kid had nothing to worry about.

Haru sighed, “He’s just a kid…he didn’t mean to do anything. You know that right.”

I flopped back down onto the couch, “Yeah,” I snuggled into his side, “I know. I’m not mad…really…I mean a little…annoyed, but it’ll pass.”

“What do wanna do well we wait for it to pass, we have a later practice today after all since half the team have interviews right now.”

“Doesn’t Makoto have one?”

Haru nodded, “We should watch it.”

I grabbed the remote, “Let’s.” I said clicking on the TV and changing it to the proper station, our beautiful blond and his kind smile were plastered to the screen.

The announcers voice was smooth and milky, “Yesterday SwimmersWorld tweeted,” the tweet flashed around them on larger screens, it read: Interviewed the Japanese team, quite a few romances it would seem, and maybe even a family rivalry? Backstroke star Makoto Tachibana dating the sister of The Shark, Rin Matsuoka? The shark? Fucking awesome nickname if you ask me. Not that anyone did, but still. Approved. “Is this true?”

Makoto smiled, “Ha, it is true, not the rivalry part, but I’m dating Gou yeah.”

The women giving the interview smiled, “So you and Rin get along?”

“Yeah, we share a dorm and a best friend so I think it’s for the best.”

Haru chuckled and the women nodded, “Haruka Nanase yes? A bit more than a friend on Rin’s end of the spectrum if I’m not mistaken,” the picture flashed across the screen.

Mako looked a little nervous, but kept smiling, “They’re cute, perfect together too, but Rin and Haru were best friends first. I mean before they were anything else. They loved each other before they were _in love_ with each other.”

I liked how he put that. I liked it a lot. “And what about his sister? Is it the same as it is for them?”

“I only meant Gou when I meant Rin, so we haven’t had the time we would have needed to become best friend, but she’s…” he smiled, “she’s definitely one of the people I identify with most in the world. She’s so kind and genuine, she doesn’t lie or hide anything ever…I mean I guess she’s an awful lot like Rin in that respect, they’re both pretty blunt. They tell it like it is, but they’re kind at the heart of it all. On Gou it’s easy to see, she’s the personification of positivity and it’s so hard not to fall for her when you meet her, I mean…I like to think I did.”

Makoto had the cutest peachy blush washed over his cheeks I’d ever seen. I knew he meant every word, every sappy, pukeish, goddamn word. Gou was a lucky girl.

“What a cute story!” the women beamed, “Does she look anything like her brother?”

Makoto scoffed. He actually properly fucking scoffed. “They’re like twins.”

No no no no no. I was way more attractive than my little sister. I mean she was beautiful, duh, but it was handed down of course. From me. Obviously. Second hand beauty that she got from me. I nearly laughed at myself for the thoughts, I needed to stop with the ironic cockiness, but it was too fun, “Really? Shark teeth and all?”

Rin’s teeth were his trademark, Mako laughed, “No, no, but same hair, same facial structure, same eyes, wow their eyes are so similar it’s almost crazy, Gou’s are darker though, but it doesn’t matter they look very much alike.”

“Is that good or bad?”

“Good, I mean they’re both attractive obviously.”

“We should really get your girl on the show, she works with the team?”

“Yep, she has an internship.”

“Does she like working so closely with her brother and the rest of you?”

“I think so, she works very hard, but she seems to enjoy it.”

“Do the rest of the team like her?” I could tell Mako was thinking about the party incident when he nodded slowly and said:

“Yes.”

“Any jealousy that you go the girl over them?”

Mako shrugged, “Not sure to be honest.”

“So tell us about Haru, you said you two were close?”

“Since middle school.”

“Really wow? That long huh?”

“Yeah he’s my closest friend.”

“And is there competition between you because of the games?”

“To be honest I don’t think Haru is like that…he swims because he loves swimming, not because he wants to win and I admire that about him.” Makoto was right Haru wasn’t like that. He wasn’t competitive, he didn’t try to win…he just did. He was a natural talent no one could deny and his love for water was completely genuine. I smiled at him.

“That’s true.” I said softly.

“Hm?”

“That you don’t care about winning, you care about water.”

He shrugged, “I love what I love and everything else is just there.”

It was weird to realize I was considered part of what he loved.

We were quiet for a long time, before he added, “I love you.” We said it a lot. I don’t know why I guess it just makes you feel good to say it out loud, and even though it wasn’t new information I still smiled bigger than I liked to admit, “And everything else is just there.” His voice was barely a whisper as he pulled me against his chest and up into a kiss. The kiss was like fire. It burned across my skin covering every inch in its presence. I worked myself up onto his lap, straddling his waist as the taste of Haru’s tongue on mine left me breathless. I worked my hands into his hair, and his lingered on my waist dropping lower to cup my ass. I laughed at him under my breath, he barely caught it, but I was laughing at his obvious reluctance. Like as if I could actually tell his hot piece as ass no?

I deepened the kiss grinding my hips up against his, I could feel his boner press against mine and the sensation was incredible, I heard him gasp into my mouth which had curved into a smirk against his, “This okay?”

He pulled back to look at me for second before nodding and finding my lips again, I reached my hand between us and palmed him through his sweatpants he moaned softly, and moved his hand to do the same to me, the feeling was exonerating, like years of waiting were coming to a close. A moan lingered on my lips, “W-we should probably…go to your room…” I murmured against his ear.

“Probably…” training hot kisses along my jaw.

“Before someone…walks in…” I was gasping with pleasure as he hoisted me up, my legs locking around his waist as he carried me into his bed room, he pushed me onto the bed beneath him, there was fire in his blue eyes, fire I’d never quite seen before, but that I would love to see again. I pulled at the end of his shirt and he got the message, raising his arms over his head so that I could slide the grey fabric over his head, my shirt soon followed his, both tossed on the floor in a way that would usually piss me off, but not today, not now, right now all that mattered was how Haru was kissing down my stomach, and how I could feel the heat in my cheeks as he tugged at the waist band of my pants, sliding them and my boxers down and discarding them off the edge of the mattress, he brought himself up to kiss me quickly, before lowering himself between my legs, I don’t really know what happened next because I was too busy writhing in pleasure to pay attention, but I know it involved my dick and Haru’s lips, and damn was he talented with his mouth, but his lips were missing too soon, my brain finally formed the words I wanted to say, damn did it take long enough it seemed like two full minutes passed before I was able to murmur, “Fuck me…p-please…” It was strangled and broken, but I managed to fucking say it so I deserved a gold star because god knows in that moment being able to say anything would be a damn accomplishment.

He brought his lips up to mine and kissed me a few time, “Are you sure?”

I pulled him closer to me, my hands working at getting his pants off, “Fucking positive.” I said kissing him.

“Have you ever…?” Damn he was asking me if I’d ever been fucked before? The answer was no obviously. I’d never had any sex before now and god was I more of a blushing virgin than I ever wanted to admit, I shook my head, and shied away from his gaze, he placed his elbows on the mattress on either side of my face, his hands reached up and brushed the long maroon strands out of my face, “Do you trust me?” he asked quietly.

I nodded. Unable to use words at this point. In my current situation having a conversation with Groot would have been easier than attempting a conversation with me.

His thumb traced circles on my cheek, “I love you.”

“I love you.” I said very much like a certain tree-man might say ‘I. Am. Groot.’

He laughed a little, “You’re beautiful.”

Me? I was beautiful? No. No. He had it upside down and backwards, he was beautiful. Him. He was stunning and flawless. And god, he was just so fucking…perfect.

Haru reached under the bed and retrieved a bottle of lube and a condom which he slipped on his newly exposed length in record time, then he dripped some lube onto his fingers and told me to spread my legs which made me blush even harder than I had been previously…seriously how much could I fucking blush before my head exploded? I threw my arms up to cover my heated face and heard Haru chuckle a little as he pushed one finger against my hole, a few seconds later my beautiful boyfriend was finger fucking me, pushing it in and pulling it out, by the time he added the third he’d hit that special spot quite a few time and I decided I enjoyed this though I was pretty sure I enjoyed everything Haru did. Always.

The finger fucking had been going on for a full twenty minutes when I managed to choke out, “Haru…no more fingers…please. I need you.”

His face was sort of blank as he settled himself between my legs probing my hole with the head of his dick, I felt myself stretch around him, there was a sharp pain for a while, but it dulled quickly as he began to move, slowly at first and then faster until he was at an good pace for the both of us.

It turns out my precious, quiet little Haru, was quite the monster in bed. I made a soft sound between moans that was reminiscent of a laugh, it was always the quiet ones that were the kinkiest after all…not that I’d seen that yet, but damn I hoped it was true. Correction: The quiet ones and Rin are the kinkiest. Always add me to the equation for more a hundred more kinks.

My thoughts were interrupted by the increasing speed of Haru’s thrusts, I locked my legs were locked at the small of his back and he pounded into me, the slapping sound of skin on skin filling the room, accompanied by the creak of the beds frame, I couldn’t count the number of time I said his name, hundreds probably, at least twice in between every moan and there were a lot of fucking moans, but it was okay because he moaned just as much and said my name just as often. We shared a few sloppy kisses, ones that didn’t last very long, but meant the world.

Ones I would never forget.

He continued to pump into, and when I came I convulsed around him, fireworks lit up behind my eyes, no wait…not fireworks…they were stars, the same ones that had filled Haru’s on the golf course that night now filled mine. A few pumps later Haru came too, I could feel his body seize up, before he turned to jelly, falling against my chest like he had no bones, I reached up and slipped my fingers into his soft ebony hair, kissing his head softly as we recovered. We were silent, the only sound was our jagged breaths, but it was comfortable. It was a beautiful comfortable silence and I was sure I would trade every word for the rest of my life to have more beautiful silences like this with Haru.

He didn’t actually pull out of me until he was somewhat recovered, a soft moan escaped my lips followed by an odd feeling of emptiness, and not long after that a sore feeling between my legs that I couldn’t shake even if I’d actually wanted to. I didn’t by the way. I never wanted to. Because it was proof, I’d been with the person I’d loved, and he loved me too. And yeah sure I wasn’t naïve enough to believe sex was in anyway the same as love, but hell if his words didn’t prove it I felt like this somehow could.

I don’t know when Haru’d pushed the dirtied sheets to the floor, but I knew that his comforter, which thanks to Haru’s terrible cleaning skills had escaped the dirtiness out sex had brought by having been pushed way down to the foot of his bed, was now draped across our bodies and Haru was snuggled into my side, his nose pressed against my neck, I’d managed to pull my boxers on and so had he so we weren’t completely naked, much to my dismay, but we were still wrapped up in a little impenetrable ball of intimacy.

I traced little circles across the small of his back, “I love you.”

A tiny smile pulled at his lips, “And everything else is just there.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO IT'S SUNDAY! duh. And I put the notes at the end bc I wanted to talk about things I feel you might question after reading the chapter :)
> 
> 1\. MY REASON FOR SMUT IS I WANTED TO WRITE SMUT AND BIG THINGS JUST HAPPENED SO RIN IS HAPPY AND HARU IS HAPPY AND THEY WANNA CELEBRATE AND WHAT BETTER WAY TO CELEBRATE THAN SEX???  
> 2\. Rin is sub here, lemme explain why, first Rin was a virgin (he probably wouldn't be, but he spent 11 years stuck on the same guy soooo yeah no sex for Rin) also Rin strikes me as a very dominate person around people who don't matter or in public, but when he's on the receiving end of affection I think he'd get very flustered.  
> 3\. First time writing smut, but were working on it.  
> 4\. Haru is not a virgin obviously, but we'll get into that later it doesn't matter all that much, but obviously he's had other boyfriends.  
> 5\. I DONT KNOW HOW HARU WOULD BE DURING SEX BC HE'S SO STOIC AND TBH VERY HARD TO WRITE.
> 
> (like seriously Haru is pretty ooc most of this fic, but we do realize he's only every actually had like 9 lines in the whole show that weren't internal commentary and most of them are "i only swim free" which is great, but ummmm, not so great when he needs to say things.)
> 
> Okayyyyyy those things being said there will be more between Nagisa and Rin asap because they need to talk obviously, but it won't be hella drama since the next problem is coming up fast and it'll be the actually turning point of this fic. The turning point starts at their interview with The Paper Sun which will be next chapter (sorry for all the interviews, but they're fun that'll be the last one).
> 
> More questions? Ask me on Tumblr at oswwinoswald and my anime blog has changed to: senpaimatsuoka 
> 
> Thanks so much for all the support you've been giving me and this story it literally means everything to me I love you all so much! Please keep on telling me what you think :)


	11. I Could Never Love You Back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The interview, nervous Haru, oh and a certain shark comes in to fuck shit up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SCHOOL IS TOMORROW HOLY SHIT KILL ME. I had to get this to you. I went to a Panic! At the Disco concert and it fucked me in the ass like seriously my schedule is off and I'm not ready, but hey PANIC! AT THE FUCKING DISCO HAS BEEN MY FAVORITE BAND SINCE I WAS 5 AND IT WAS WORTH IT. Hahahahahahh here's the chapter, I like it, confrontation next chapter WOAHHHH
> 
> I love P!ATD so much they make an actual appearance in the fic and hey lots of fandom references I wanna know if you can catch the big one, but if not then okayyyyy. 
> 
> We have P!ATD, Nightvale, Lord of the Rings, SNK, Sherlock, KNK, like a whole treasure trove.
> 
> I'll tell you right now I don't like the character we're bringing into the chapter because I think he's an asshole so yeah antagonist or the fic yay!
> 
> Thanks so much for all the support! Keep on commenting and leaving kudos it means the world to me and I love you all sooooooooooo much! Wish me luck at school ewww! 
> 
> Extra questions? oswwinoswald or senpaimatsuoka on Tumblr :)
> 
> Gimme looove

For the first time in our relationship Haru was the one with sweaty palms as we headed inside the building where The Paper Sun was filmed, led by the same pink haired girl as before who’d made the point of reintroducing herself as Mirai though I was positive Haru hadn’t heard on word she’d said since they’d arrived, the cutie was literally shaking.

I squeezed his hand as we followed Mirai to the set, “It’s gonna be fine, Haru, it’ s only an hour, what could go wrong?”

It was easy to forget how little Haru actually spoke. Like sure to me, but to other people? He was a man of few words; interviews had to be a pain for him.

“So if you’ll wait back here,” Mirai  said turning to look at us, there was a slight blush on her face when she said it, “Kanabara-Senpai will call you out in a moment.” Originally I thought the blush was because she was just a generally flustered person, but now it seemed like maybe it had something to do with whoever Kanabara was, “The show is filmed in front of a live audience so try not to use an explicit curses if you can, we try and keep it PG as best we can, you have about an hour before you have to go on, Hiroomi will do some light make-up on you if that’s okay,” she blushed, “not that you two need it…but camera’s play tricks.”

Haru was silent, so I decided to answer, “That’s fine, who else is on the show today?”

“Well our musical guest is an American group today called, Panic! At the Disco, I think, and we actually have some more swimmers here today, some from the Australian team, I don’t know why Senpai would want interviews with them, but he does, I guess he’s working some angle.” She shrugged, “I wouldn’t understand, I’m not very creative. A few activists. Also!” she seemed to get excited all of the sudden, “I think a voice actor is out there right now, Mamoru Miyano, have you heard of him?”

I shook my head, “No, I don’t think I have.”

“Oh! I thought your voices were similar,” she blew some loose hair out of her eyes, “must be me. Anyway someone will give you a ten minute warning when the time comes, just be ready to go by then.”

We nodded settling into the chairs that had been provided for us, Haru was knotting his hands together nervously, I looked around the set, there was a door leading onto the stage, a group of young men in shiny jackets were jumping around in the corner, all of them were attractive, I noted casually, one of them had grabbed the tallest one by the sides of his face and was singing soft notes specifically to him their lips brushing together softly, I heard the other one called him by name a few seconds later, “Brendon,” was what I’d heard, and the one who’d been singing immediately turned around like he hadn’t just been in an intimate situation with the tall one and looked in the direction his name had been called from, “Want me to sing to you too Spence?” he joked, giving the man a kiss on the cheek, a women with thick black hair and blue eyes laughed from the corner a little boy was sitting in her lap wearing a tiny jacket that matched Brendon’s perfectly. Nothing I’d just seen made much since except that I was pretty sure there was quite a bit of sex going on between the four of them. Probably the band Mirai had mentioned. Across the room sat  a young women with thick black hair, she was flipping through a rainbow colored journal, looking just as nervous as Haru, and speaking of he hadn’t stopped shaking, I reached over and grabbed both of his hands.

“Are you nervous?” Haru tried to shake his head, but ended up nodded furiously, I laughed and kissed him, earning me a sharp whistle from Brendon, Haru blushed, and I ran a thumb over is hot cheeks, “I’ll go get you some water okay, take a few deep breaths, there’s nothing to worry about.” I headed over to the snack table returning a minute later just in time to see the singer walking away from my boyfriend, I handed him a bottle of water, he looked slightly less shaken, “What’d he have to say?” I questioned quirking an eyebrow.

He nodded, “He said before a show he liked to think about his wife singing to him, two of his favorite things, even though she can’t sing very well…”

“So what are you thinking about?”

“You…swimming.”

I laughed, “That must not be very hard since it’s like all I ever do.”

“And you do it very well.”

I smiled at him and caught his lips with mine, “So do you, drink your water.”

“We should swim when we get back.”

“I agree.”

Haru nodded and sipped on his water a few minutes later a black haired boy with straight bangs sauntered over to us and began dusting our faces with powders I couldn’t identify and didn’t care too, Haru sneezed a few times as the brushes bristles tickled his nose, and damn it was cute.

The black haired boy then gave us our aforementioned ten minute warning.

Haru had straightened my collar about fourty times in those ten minutes, before I grabbed his hand and kissed it, “Me and water.” I whispered receiving a small smile.

Mirai stood by the stage door with us, the announcement went through the room, she counted three on her fingers and opened the door, the room on the other side was full of people, there was a stage in the center where an attractive blond guy sat in a plaid sweater he was classically handsome the way you expect a TV host to be, Mirai led us to the couch her eyes shining as she watched the blond who thanked her for showing us to our seats, she replied with a tiny squeal and made her way back how she’d come.

He smiled, shaking our hands, and looking at the crowd, “Rin Matsuoka and Haruka Nanase everyone! The stars of the 2016  Olympic Team!”

The audience cheered.

I gave them an excited wave and Haru looked like he was going to vomit. I prayed to god that he didn’t, placing my hand over his to comfort him best I could, “We’re excited to be here.” I said flashing a grin at the audience.

“This weeks been busy for you two am I right?”

“Insanely,” he recounted everything that had happened, coming out, interviews, sex? This was like his god damn week. “hadn’t really planned to go public about our relationship so soon, but hey what happens, happens.”

“It was all an accident right? Concerning a teammate.”

I laughed, “Nagisa, he’s our roommate actually, he uh, he really likes Instagram. It was an innocent enough picture, but you see I hadn’t actually told my mom yet so…”

The guys face was a priceless ‘oh shit’ expression, “Wow so you came out on accident? Bet you were pretty pissed?”

“Uh yeah at first, but my mom was insanely understanding about it so I guess I actually owe Nagisa a thank you.”

“So you two are cool?”

“Yeah, he’s apologized…like every other sentence literally, and he did actually help me out so…we’re cool.”

“It didn’t take a toll on the relationship?”

Haru and I actually laughed, “Not at all.”

“Good to hear, everyone’s interested in you two, you’re Japan’s favorite couple, so tell me where’d you meet?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but apparently Haru was taking this question, “Eight years ago in Iwatobi he was in my swim class.”

“Seven years? Wow! Childhood sweethearts then?”

“Not exactly…I mean…he’s my best friend…I’ve always loved him, but we were kids then…and I didn’t think about things that way, up until recently I didn’t care about anything except water and swimming, and then I ran into Rin again, funny story actually because I’d just wanted to eat his roommates food, but when he opened the door…I just…” Haru blushed vibrantly and looked down, “he’s beautiful.”

My mind was racing. What? I was beautiful? That night…I mean…he seemed so…non-chalant, like he almost didn’t notice, damn I wanted to kiss him. I always wanted to kiss him. Fuck. What was wrong with me, shit, I was so busy scolding I almost didn’t notice Kanabara was asking me a question until Haru squeezed my hand.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“I was asking if it was the same for you?”

“Not exactly…I um…Haru was my first crush…I realized I liked him when I was eleven, but I was so scared of what people would think I literally left the country, I never stopped liking him and I guess somewhere along the way I fell in love with him…but I was scared and I was still scared for a long ass time after we reunited, but I sucked it up eventually,” I held our entwined fingers over our heads, “obviously.”

“First crush? Was he your first kiss too?”

The ‘ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo’ from the crowd was laugh worthy, it was like in middle school when someone got called to the office, I shook my head, “He wasn’t,” I thought back on it, my first kiss had been a girl…someone from school, nothing important, “sadly.” I added.

There was a stream of ‘awwww’ from the audience.

“But he was your first love?”

I nodded, “First and last hopefully, falling in love is a pain in the ass.”

“And what about you Haru?”

“First and last.”

“So you’re basically the power couple, fastest in the water, the Shark and the Dolphine.”

I thought of the dolphin plushie on Haru’s bed, “Where’d that name even come from?” I asked sort of curious, it was a new nickname, he’d never been called a shark before other than by his mother.

“Your teeth, tell me do you sharpen them or?”

I laughed, oh shit I always forgot about my teeth, “Nope, all na-tu-ral.”

“Aren’t they painful? Is kissing like hard?”

Haru just shook his head and leaned over planting a chaste kiss on my lips, “If kissing Rin ever starts becoming a difficult thing to do I’ll let you know.”

I blushed, damn him.

“You two are so cute, honestly, the fangirls are going crazy, speaking on fangirl, a few fans sent us questions for you, do you mind?”

“Not at all.”

“Okay so, the first is from jaegerbombastic via tumblr and it is: Does who swims faster correspond with who, you knows, faster?”

I couldn’t see past my blush god help me, fucking Christ, I tried to speak, but stumbled over my words a little, so Haru seemed to take it as his queue to answer, “Our speeds are exactly the same if that says anything.”

The audience did that oooooo thing as I finally figured out how to work my lungs again.

Kanabara laughed, “Next question is from @idontshaveforsherlockholmes on twitter: what’s the last movie you watched together?”

“Allegiant…well…I mean…watched isn’t really, he fell asleep on my shoulder, we weren’t even together then, but it was the cutest thing ever. As athletes we don’t get to go to the movies that often so it was a few months ago, but it was nice.”

 “Cute!” Kanabara laughed, “Okay next is from @perfect_carlos1 on twitter and they ask: Would you rather live in Nightvale or Middle Earth?”

Haru cocked an eyebrow, “I only swim free?”

“Shit um…” I looked across the audience, “damn I have to say Nightvale only because I’d really like to kiss my boyfriend under the glowing lights above the Arby’s sign.”

“Okay last question, it says it’s for Haru, from @BrendonUrie via twitter: Did it work?”

Haru looked at me and smiled, like the tiniest hint of a smile ever, “Yeah.”

“Okay! Thank you so much for coming to talk to us today.”

We smiled and waved at the crowd, “Thanks for having us.”

He nodded, “Up next we’ll Panic! At the Disco singing a set from their new album, and after Australian swimmer Sousuke Yamazaki.”

My heart stopped beating. What?

What?

We were supposed to leave so they could bring the band out after the commercial break, but I couldn’t move. What did they mean Sousuke Yamazaki? My Sousuke? What?

Haru tugged my sleeve, “Rin…are you okay?”

“Uh…I…Sousuke?”

“Yeah he’s a swimmer like us, have you heard of him…”

“I…I know him.”

“What?”

“He went to my school in Australia.”

“He what?”

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. This was not happening.

Not Sousuke.

I hadn’t left things on a good note with Sousuke…

_“Jesus Rin…you’re gonna waist away waiting for someone to tell you it’s okay to be you.”_

_The rain had soaked through my shirt, leaving it stuck against my body in the most awkward way._

_“I’m not waiting for anything Sousuke. I am me. It’s not my fault I’m straight. It’s not my fault, so please just—“_

_“What? Just stop being in love with you? It doesn’t work that way, Rin. You’d know. You’re the one always crying over that girl, what’s her name Haruka?”_

_“Shut up! You don’t know what you’re talking about!”_

_“You expect me to just forget how I feel about you?”_

_“No I just—“_

_“You don’t care?”_

_“That isn’t it, dammit, you know I care about you Sousuke you’re the only friend I have I just—“_

_“You kissed me!” he was so angry I actually shrank back in fear at the force behind his words, “Stop lying Rin! I wasn’t the one who kissed first!”_

_“Stop it! I didn’t mean to, I was…I’m not—“_

_“You what? You have a girlfriend? You’re straight? Who fucking cares? You still did it!”_

_“Would you stop fucking saying I have a girlfriend?”_

_“Then who the hell is Haruka?”_

_“It isn’t your business!” The rain was picking up there was no choice but to shout._

_“It is! If she’s important enough to make you cry it is! Jesus! You say I don’t know what I’m talking about, but you won’t tell me anything. How would I even know? You’re supposed to be my best friend, aren’t you supposed to tell me shit? I love you Rin, why can’t you trust me?”_

_“Because I don’t do that! I don’t trust people! It’s not me. I can’t I’ve got too much to lose.” I spat, “I’m not gonna fall in love with you. I’m not gonna reciprocate. I can’t. I know that seems shitty, but that’s life. Life is shitty, it always has been. I won’t say I’m in love with you, I kissed you I get it, I gave you false hope, but false is all it was okay? You give me shit for pining over Haruka, but I’m not gonna stop loving someone just because there’s someone else. I don’t expect you to stop loving me  because I tell you I don’t love you, but you have to understand. I can’t and I won’t. So just please. Please stop. Stop shouting at me and telling me to grow up or move on or trust you, because I won’t do it.”_

_“Why not? Why won’t you give me a chance…I can—“_

_“Because…” I cut him off, “because I said I can’t okay?” I turned to walk away._

_“Rin!” he was shouting “Rin! Please! Stop!”_

_I didn’t say a word I couldn’t. He was my friend and I hurt him, but I wasn’t going to lie to him. I kept walking. And a few days later I was home in Japan back with my mother reminding me why I couldn’t confess my love for Haru, reminding me why I couldn’t trust Sousuke, reminding me that at the end of the day life was never fair and we never got what we asked for. Be it a straight son, or the love of a friend, or an understanding parent. Life was shit. Life was fake. Life was a lie. And it always would be._

Haru pulled me out of my memory, “Hey are you okay? What happened?”

“I just…I really fucked up, Haru. I was so scared back then…I shouldn’t have…”

“Hey…hey, it’s okay, Rin…I’ll be right back okay? You look like you’re gonna be sick, let me get you some water.

I nodded, and slumped in the same chair I’d been sitting in back stage, when I heard someone say my name, “Rin?”

 _Sousuke_.


	12. You're Crumbling, Sadly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sousuke brings back things Rin wants to forget.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hiiiiiiii soooo it's been a while guys! I'm sorry about that! Dragon Con was huge and took a LOT of my time, I was actually working on cosplay the first Sunday and the con was happening the second Sunday so okay we don't have anymore cons for like 7 days I think so we're all good :) Anyyyyway I'm back!
> 
> The chapter title is from Shades of Cool by Lana Del Rey
> 
> Thank you guys for waiting and for your support, I actually got to meet some of you guys at DragonCon and that was insane, like having people come up and complement my writing is something I never expected, like god dammit thanks so much you guys are fantastic <3
> 
> Thanks again to everyone you're amazing!!
> 
> More questions? My tumblr: oswwinoswald and senpaimatsuoka 
> 
> The track tag has changed: rinharu fic: alienation
> 
> Thanks again!!

 “Sousuke.” Not a question. Nope. A straight up statement.

“Rin, wow it is you.”

“Uh…” I was a little shocked to be honest, I hadn’t seen Sousuke in a while, since I left to come back to Japan, he was an Australian…shit…he was the swimmer Mirai had mentioned. He was in the Olympics too? “yeah…” I quirked an eyebrow, “The Olympics then?”

“Yeah, and you too, I didn’t really expect that.”

What did that even mean? “It’s always been the plan.”

There was a bit of an awkward silence in which the taller male mumbled, “Right,” before his eyes narrowed slightly, “You’ve got a boyfriend too right?”

Ya know that awkward moment when your ex asks if your seeing anyone? This was like that except worse because he wasn’t my ex, nope, he was a friend a who I’d blatantly lied to about my sexuality, “Uh…yeah. I do.”

“Funny, I remember you telling me you were straight when I said I loved you.”

I cringed. I didn’t want to think about that, but I knew Sousuke and I knew he wouldn’t just let it go. He didn’t have a forgetful bone in his body. The bastard. “I was confused then.” That wasn’t exactly true, I’d known I was gay, I’d always known, but I was head over heels for a boy a hundred miles away and that wasn’t going to change because a tall handsome stranger confessed his feelings for me in the school gardens a week before I’d left for Japan. I’d admit Sousuke was the only real friend I’d made in Australia, but apparently he’d thought of us as more than that and Haru was the only person who’d ever been _more than that._

“Wow it took two whole months to figure yourself out. Convenient timing Rin.”

I bit my lip, “I didn’t plan on it Sousuke. And I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said what I did, but I was scared and confused.” _And some of it was true._

He didn’t accept of decline my apology in fact he ignored it, “Why didn’t you tell me?” Sousuke who was usually an emotionless wall looked hurt.

“I—“

“I wasn’t lying when I said I loved you…I would have waited. I would have tried to help you.”

“I wasn’t about to ask you to wait for me. Or for help…and it doesn’t matter because either way I—“

“I’ll still wait. As long as it takes…” there was a slight pause and then something clicked behind Sousuke’s turquoise eyes, “He’s the person you used to cry about all the time isn’t he?” his voice was accusatory, “You let me think it was a girl, but it was him the whole time. The one you were in love with from back home that you could never have? And you still wanted him after all the shit he put you through?”

“He didn’t know back then. I was hiding…it wasn’t his fault—“

“I could hear you crying Rin. At night. When you thought I was asleep, or not paying attention…You said Haruka, I thought you meant a girl, but…you,” he took a deep breath and closed his eyes he was thinking. Collecting his thoughts. “Rin…someone who would let you cry like that…he’ll hurt you again and I’ll be there when he’s finished with you.” I’d never been more scared by a sentence in my entire life. _When he’s finished with you._ Like it was some sort of obvious fact that he’d get bored of me, _finished,_ like a race. Quick and clean. Over. I inhaled best I could, reminding myself that Haru wasn’t like that.

“You don’t know Haru.”

“I know what he did to you.”

“That was on _me._ ” I was raising my voice, “I did that. Not him. I was the reason I was hurt.”

“He made you feel that way in the first place.”

“So? _So?_ What does it matter? It’s not his fault I fell in love with him. He had no clue back then, but I’m with him now and he loves me. He’s still just as oblivious as he was back then. He still doesn’t know the effect he has on people, but that’s okay…because even if he does leave…it would be a privilege to have my heart broken by him.” Wow I was going TIFIOS on that shit. Might as well diagnose me with cancer and cheesy metaphor syndrome, but it was true. Haru was that sort of person. He was beautiful without knowing it, he was everything you could want and more, he was a character from a young adult novel in more ways than one, but he was real, and he was shy and he was quiet and he owned twelve different pairs of the same swimsuit, he was an idiot who loved water first and me second and I was okay with it. And god dammit it would be a blessing just to be able to say he broke my heart, because that would mean he’d paid me attention in the first place. I was a fool in love and I always would be, but fool or no fool I didn’t regret falling in love with Haru for one second of my life.

“No. It would be his privilege to have his heart broken by you.” Sousuke’s words were bitter. Like coffee without crème. And I thought for a second about how it was possible for other people to feel that way. How someone else could love their partner just as much as I loved Haru and it would be okay, but one thing I hated about that was that yeah people could love what was theirs, but people could also love what wasn’t and what never would be theirs. And it would be painful for them as it had been painful for me up until a few weeks ago. I could see it reflected in Sousuke’s eyes. The unrequited love. And I hated it. I hated that someone I called a friend was going to have to live like I’d had to live.

I swallowed, “Don’t do that to yourself.” He was my friend and I didn’t want him chasing a fruitless dream. No I wouldn’t let him, because chasing me was useless. I knew that. I knew there was no chance for him, not as things currently stood, and maybe that made me a shitty person, because damn taking away someone’s hope seemed like a shitty thing to do, but I wouldn’t let him get stuck on me. No. I wouldn’t let that happen.

“Do what?”

“Don’t wait for me. Don’t chase after me. I’m not yours to chase. And I’m not gonna lead you on, I won’t give you false hope I’m telling you right now because you’re my friend and I don’t want to see you like that: I love him. And I’ve been fighting too hard for too long to lose him, okay? I’m not going to let it happen. I’m not going to give him up without a fight.”

He swallowed his eyes burning into me, “I’m not going to give you up without one either.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means what I said Rin. It means I’ll fight for you.”

“And I meant what I said: you won’t win.”

“You don’t know that ye—“

“Rin?” the small voice came from behind. Haru. “What’s going on?” I shifted around to look at him, he was holding a bottle of water in his hand his eyebrow cocked, he glanced between Sousuke and I a few times, “Is this Sousuke?” his body was ridged, on edge like he was approaching a wild animal.

I nodded slowly, “He was just—“

“Going. I was leaving.” Sousuke said. You know liquid nitrogen? That stuff Bill Nye used to instantly freeze ping pong balls? Yeah well Sousuke’s voice was colder than that. It was like the temperature of Pluto. And not only was it cold, it was sharp too, like a razor. Hatred. That was all I could define it as. “Goodbye Rin.” He said looking down at me momentarily before brushing past Haru, and by _brushing past_ I mean almost knocking him down, I had half a mind to beat his ass for touching my boyfriend, but I decided I’d let it slide just this once, probably because of the look Haru was giving me.

I met his eyes, why did I feel like crying? Shit. I held my breath willing myself not to speak until we were in the car. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“Him…what I did to him…everything?”

“What did you do to him?”

 I wasn’t worried Haru wouldn’t understand, I trusted he would, but I still felt awful for how I acted, even if Sousuke was in the wrong too, it didn’t change what I said, “He’s in love with me.” I said quietly.

Haru tensed noticeably, though a few seconds later nodded, “Understandable…”

“He used to be my roommate and basically my only friend…I uh…I screwed up one night and I kissed him…” I closed my eyes, I wanted to make an excuse for it, but I didn’t know if I had any, “And everything went to hell because it turns out he was in love with me the whole time and when I kissed him he thought I liked him back, but I just…” I looked at Haru, and counted my lucky stars he existed, “I couldn’t. I didn’t.  And I was so scared…he was the first boy I ever kissed and I was so scared my mom would find out somehow…and god…when he told me it freaked me out so much…I said some terrible things to him.”

Haru looked at me. Just looked at me for a while, before unscrewing the cap on the water bottle he was still holding and extending it towards me, “Everyone makes mistakes.”

I glanced at it and took a small sip, “Seems like I make more than most.”

He shrugged, “We all think that. We’re self-loathing idiots sometimes, does he blame you for what you said?”

“He said he still loves me.”

Haru froze up. “What did you say?” Frozen, but calm. As always. Fear undetectable to anyone who didn’t know him, but I knew him. And I knew he was scared, but I didn’t know _why._

“Lots of things. That I love you and I’m happy and he should move on.”

“But…?”

“But I don’t think he will.”

“I want him to. I want him to move on and be happy, but he won’t. I know he won’t. He’s not like that.”

“Were you two—“

“No. For your information I’ve been pining over a certain blue eyed water-obsessed boy for eight years.”

A tiny smile quirked on his lips, “So he’s in love with you…do you think he’ll do anything about it?”

“He’s a good person. He’s not a villain, he’s confused right now…about me and you and how he feels, but he’s not a bad person.” I ran a hand through my hair and sucked in a deep breath, “But Sousuke doesn’t give up. He’s never been that type of person so I guess I really don’t know what he’ll do.”

There was a short type of silence, in which somehow it was made clear that Haru understood, and that he also wasn’t worried about it because the next words out of his mouth were, “You still wanna swim?”

Haru was Haru, maybe he was worried, maybe he was perfectly fine, but either way he didn’t show it. There was no sort of identifying emotion on his face, which to be honest, had been a frustrating thing for me in the past, but right now it felt good. It felt normal. It felt like the past wasn’t coming back to haunt me. I nodded, “I just want to forget this happened.” I said as we walked through the parking lot to my car.

“Is that because you’re scared of him or scared of what you said to him?”

“Both? I don’t know…I mean…he’s just a person. He’s a rival teammate sure, but I don’t think I’d say I’m scared of him…but I am…I mean…I’m not proud of what I said, but what else was I supposed to say? At the time I was shitting myself about my sexuality, I didn’t want to admit I was gay so I basically kissed him and like the closeted homosexual I was shouted ‘NO HOMO’ right at his face and ran off more or less. It was shitty. It was a mistake, but either way…” I trailed off, “either way…either way that was how it had to end because I could never have had the mental capacity to love him. Too much of me…” Nope. I had to stop. Too cheesy. Way to fucking cheesy. “It just wouldn’t have been fair to either of us so even if it was wrong it was initially the right choice.”

His hand slipped into mine as we pulled into the training centers lot, “It’s okay Rin. I’m not judging you for what you did you don’t have to explain yourself to me.”

I didn’t really know what to say to that.

“Everyone has a past, me, you, Makoto, Nagisa, everyone. But your past isn’t what matters to me, your future is what matters to me. You’re a good person, you have the tendency to overreact and get angry and you’re the most competitive person I know, but you’re good. Everyone comes with baggage, everyone is emotionally scarred, you can take them as they are or leave them. I love you. Some stupid fight you had months ago? I could care less. You’re sorry and that’s all you can be, so please…just come swim with me.”

He was usually a man of so few words hearing him now, expressing his opinions; it was like reassurance that I wasn’t going to lose him. I took a deep breath, one last thing to calm me down, and looked up at him, letting the fire back into my eyes, a grin lighting my features, “I’ll race you.”

Haru didn’t say anything, he just offered me a tiny smile, and then proceeded to wait impatiently as I changed into my swimsuit, and became more impatient as we made our way to the pool. What has started out as casually holding hands hand turned into Haru basically dragging me towards the pool, but the thing was I wasn’t resisting, I wasn’t reluctant to get to the pool he was just so damn excited he was going ten times faster than another more averagely excited person.

We’d chosen the outdoor pool again, it was open this time luckily so we didn’t have to climb the fence. There was no lifeguard on duty, and no other athletes at the pool (most of them preferred the indoor pools). Haru wasted no time stripping off the swim jacket I’d made him wear for the walk over and diving into the pool. I laughed and followed him.

“I win.” Was the only thing Haru said when I swam up to him, he wrapped his arms around my neck.

“Do you really? Because it seems like I’m the one with the hot guy’s arms around me.”

He grabbed my arms and pulled them around his waist, “Yes.”

My mouth hovered over his, “This is where we had our first kiss.”

He nodded inching closer.

“Best idea I’ve ever had.”

“Timing could have used a little work.”

I shrugged, “When is the timing ever right?”

Haru’s lips grazed mine, “Now.” He breathed pressing our lips together, his legs encircled my waist, and he deepened the kiss.

I laced my fingers into his hair as his tongue crept into my mouth, his skin was beaded with water droplets, his hair was dripping onto my face, but it was hard to notice when he was kissing me. It was hard to notice anything when he was kissing me. We were alienated from the rest of the world. Just us and our mixing heart beats against the world. Nothing mattered, nothing was on my mind, not Sousuke, not interviews, not the games, just the feeling of Haru’s lips on mine. I could breath.

He broke the kiss in the end, reluctantly, I might add.

He hugged me against him.

“Thank you.” I whispered, grateful tears were budding in my eyes. What he was doing was obvious. He was trying to distract me from my thoughts, he was trying to comfort me, and it was working beautifully.

“I love you, Rin.”

_God only knows why._

I tucked my head into the crook of his neck and nodded against his shoulder, “I know.”

I’d never understand why. Not in a year, not in ten, but somehow I did know. And it was wonderful.


End file.
